Bronze at the Royal Academy

The exhibition was very crowded. I was impressed with the amount of objects that had been gathered together, arranged by theme.

A sign at the entrance said, "Bronze is uniquely suited to ... capturing the fall of light", so it was slightly disappointing that it was impossible to walk around many of the objects, and not just because of the crowds, but because of the way the objects were arranged. For example, Barbara Hepworth's Curved Form (Trevalgan) stuck in a glass box against a wall did it no favours at all.

A few objects were really interesting – like Picasso's bronze baboon that made use of a toy motor car for the head and a plant pot for the body; and two or Nigerian figures from the fifteenth century, the huge door knocker from Durham cathedral – and so on. There were so many varied and different pieces. The Chimaera of Arezzo, an Etruscan masterpiece on loan from Florence, was amazing. With a serpent for a tail, and a goat’s head grafted onto a lion’s back, this snarling, fire-breathing monster appears terrifying, and convincing. Hard to believe it's from 400BC. It was fascinating to see works of art from so many different cultures and ages so close together. For example, The Evening Shadow, an ancient Etruscan statuette of an elongated figure that’s really just a long stretched wire, and nearby there is The Cage by the 20th-century sculptor Alberto Giacometti, whom it influenced.

A few had incredible stories attached to them, for example, the recent discovery (2010) of a bronze head by someone with a metal detector, and the 4th Century dancing satyr found by fisherman in 1988 off the coast of Sicily..

Taylor Wessing

I always enjoy visiting the Taylor Wessing prize portraits. This year's winner really impressed me. A very simple and direct picture. The photographer, Margarita Teichroeb, explained that she only took two frames. The expression contains so much. The subject appears insecure and yet approachable.

Going Down to Liverpool

Biennial 2012: the Cunard building

There's a huge amount of variation in this exhibition.

I was immediately taken by the curious picture by Danish collective, Superflex, of paintstakingly painted signs.

I couldn't help but wonder what it was all for. But then I was struck by the amount of empty office and commercial space in Liverpool.

It's a good idea, but also pretty bleak and boring.

Angela Lizón
The small size of the canvas was the thing that interested me. Doll's house work.

Pat O'Connor

The patchwork montage and use of different mediums – gouache, acrylic, pencil, ink, watercolour, collage – and the seeming lack of connection between the images; and yet the images seemed to work, somehow. Need to think more about this.

Jarik Jongman

This was the piece that interested me most – partly because of my own work in this are. I think Waiting Room, bleak, dark and uninviting, was also a very impressive and rich composition. I was reminded of Henry Moore's Tube Shelter paintings.

The loneliness and bleakness of the place has been further enhanced by the way Jongman has damaged the work with white spirit and scrubbing, to make the image thin on one side.

The destruction of the paint and canvas made me think hard about my own work. I am always so precise and careful and don't move on until I am absolutely certain that everything is right. The effects that Jongman has achieved, the cracking of the canvas, reminds me of the work of Old Masters.

A picture that really did impress me, part of the gallery's permanent collection, was Gustave Doré's Flower Sellers, London. It seems at first sight a slightly sentimental image, in a standard Victorian style.

But the faces are strange and very well done. The style of painting, the anxiety, the composition, all seem to work perfectly.

Turner Prize

Paul Nobel: Villa Joe (Graphite on paper).

I wasn't sure what to make of this large-scale piece. The detail was fine and distinct. The shading and tone were immaculate. Each rock, each granule, were beautifully finished. So much intricate detail. But what is it meant to be, what are you meant to make of it. I don't know. It is very repetitive. And not moving, at all.

Luke Fowler is a film maker with a good understanding of the structures of social existence. He edits moving image and sound archive material to reveal previously unseen assumptions and positions that undermine the original material.

The Two-Frame pictures were scenes from the main work, All Divided Selves. I like the way two pictures were put together. The juxtaposition of the images works well, the way that they connect with each other.

Elizabeth Price. She involves text and image to create a narrative. In the video there are images of architecture, internet clips, pop music, news footage. Authoritative statements are countered by the use of visuals and sounds that speak directly to the emotions. "The swing between analysis and sensory pleasure acknowledges the complexity of our relationship to the world of systems and ideology, and to cycles of desire and consumption."

Moriyama at Tate Modern

I loved the panel of polaroid pictures on a panel. The neat, and yet busy effect. Images almost distorted, but controlled by the grid lines.

William Klein

Exhibition at Tate Modern.

Nearly all of his pictures are of people, whether posed or unposed. Often, they are quite busy without an obvious centre of focus and the eye does not know where to look.

He documented New York as a photo diary. This reminds me of my own diary routine project. They are generally of large crowds, people in bars or on the train – and there's a great sense of New York to them.

Quite a few of his pictues are out of focus in parts. I prefer the smaller images and am not particularly keen on those pictures that don't involve people.

The exhibition display reminds me of a comic strip, with frames the same size and distance apart and all black-and-white.

I was interested to read that before he took up photography he was an abstract painter.

In one room is a long series of photographs of people standing waiting on a train platform. The faces look like they've been edited in PhotoShop. But I like the way the frames are set out, that enable you to walk along in front, as if on an inspection.