Schiaparelli: Fashion Becomes Art, Victoria and Albert Museum, London, UK 

The much-anticipated exhibition, which opened this week to a fanfare of headlines, is the first-ever UK exhibition dedicated to Elsa Schiaparelli, showcasing the pioneering Italian couturière’s unique, surrealist sensibility. The museum promotes the show with Schiaparelli’s famous quote: "For me, dress designing is not a profession but an art," which highlights how the designer blurred the lines between art and apparel from 1920s to 1950s, while also connecting her legacy to modern couture and the continuation of her artistic vision at the maison by creative director Daniel Roseberry. The glittering fashion showcase brings together more than 200 items, including rare garments, accessories and jewellery, and turns a spotlight on iconic collaborations with artists such as Salvador Dalí and Jean Cocteau, including the famous Shoe Hat (1937)  and the Skeleton and Tears Dress, both conceived in 1938. Tickets are £28 on weekdays and £30 on weekends. From March 28, 2026, to November 8, 2026, V&A’s Sainsbury Gallery, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 2RL; vam.ac.uk

Four Seasons, Waddesdon Manor, Buckinghamshire, UK

Light artist Bruce Monroe is best known for creating large-scale, immersive light installations made up of thousands of components but also collaborating with his daughter Tink on multi-sensory art exhibitions exploring themes of nature, memory and environmental consciousness. Bruce provides the framework with his monumental installations and Tink a focus on natural sustainable materials which  create "emotional landscapes”. This exhibition at the manor’s Coach House Gallery presents new work by Bruce that combines digital photography, light, projection and sound, including a piece which translates the music of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons into dynamic light. Tink’s simultaneously uses punctured backlit barkcloth – creating an ethereal work that is a commentary on the natural environment. Tickets for Waddeston Manor are £27 for adults. From 27 March to 29th November. Waddesdon Manor, Waddesdon, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, HP18 0JH; waddesdon.org.uk

Constable: A Cast of Characters, Christchurch Mansion, Ipswitch, UK

As part of the 250-year celebrations of Constable’s birth by Colchester and Ipswich Museums (CIMS), this exhibition at Christchurch Mansion in Ipswich presents more than 100 works and objects, including portraits, sketches and landscapes by the artist and others (his cast of supporting characters), which give context to the artist’s work and reveal stories about the people who supported the artist, helping to turn Suffolk into “Constable Country”.  

The 19th-century English Romantic landscape painter prioritised naturalistic observation over studio work breaking with the conventions of the day and used advanced techniques in his paintings, wielding a palette knife to apply thick impasto over darker tones to capture the sparkle of light on water and the freshness of a scene. He focused on local landscapes close to his heart as he believed that "painting is but another word for feeling". Free to visit. From 28 March to 14 June. Christchurch Mansion, Christchurch Park, Soane Street, Ipswich, Suffolk, IP4 2BE; ipswich.cimuseums.org.uk/constable250

Time's Scythe, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Yorkshire, UK

British artist Nicola Turner's choice of materials is key to her “dark” large-scale installations. In using “dead” materials, primarily wool and waste horsehair, she explores the history and memory of these elements, and how they can be given new life. What emerges from the pieces are the dual dichotomies of life and death, human and non-human, attraction and repulsion. Her site-responsive installation at the 18th-century Chapel within the 500-acre Bretton Hall estate unfolds through unsettling, alien-like sculpture made from wool and horsehair, which clings to the building like an invasive vine, entering through an upper window, before spilling over the balcony to inhabit the nave.

Visitors will be able to walk amongst the sinuous forms, with the smell of wool heightening its sensory impact. The work is made all the more powerful as a flock of sheep grazes in the fields surrounding the Chapel. Adult tickets are £11 with Giftaid, children go free. From 28 March to 27 September. Yorkshire Sculpture Park is located at West Bretton, Wakefield, WF4 4JX; ysp.org.uk

Canaletto & Bellotto: Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria

The Venetian painter Canaletto (1697–1768), and his nephew and protégé Bernardo Bellotto (1721–1780) are the subject of an exhibition presenting “the eighteenth century as an era between Enlightenment and spectacle, in which observation and invention are closely intertwined”. Canaletto and Bellotto's treatment of cities when painting blurred the lines between realism and fantasy. They were masters of vedute using optical aids like the camera obscura to achieve accurate, detailed city views but often manipulated cityscapes to create a more harmonious, "idealised" view, altering perspectives and lighting to "hyper-realistic" effect. This exhibition surveys works capturing views of Venice, London and Vienna. Among the highlights are Canaletto’s view of Venice from the Wallace Collection, along with a selection of his key London paintings and drawings, including works from Compton Verney and the British Museum. Nearly all of Bellotto’s views of Vienna are shown, both from the collection of the Kunsthistorisches Museum and as loans, for example from the Princely Collections of Liechtenstein. Tickets €19 to €22. From 24 March to 6 September. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Maria-Theresien-Platz, 1010 Vienna, Austria; khm.at