IN OCTOBER THE exam board AQA informed schools that it would no longer offer A and AS level exams in history of art, archaeology and classical civilisation. It was ruled that while the history of literature is considered to be a ‘hard’ subject, history of art, archaeology and classical civilisation are ‘soft’. As AQA was the only board to offer the subject, this decision would have meant an end to the teaching of history of art in schools.

ANNE OLIVIA CROOKSHANK, former professor of the History of Art at Trinity College, Dublin (TCD), fellow of the college and member of the Royal Irish Academy, died on 18th October 2016 aged nearly ninety. She will be remembered for her pioneering work – in collaboration with Desmond FitzGerald, Knight of Glin – on the history of Irish painting, and for her inspiring teaching at Trinity.

THE EXHIBITION Opus Anglicanum: Masterpieces of English Medieval Embroidery at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (to 5th February), is only the third on the subject in over a century: the first was held in 1905,[1] the second in 1963.[2] […] The present exhibition does a great service in assembling the V. & A.’s remarkable collection together with other pieces of exceptional quality, justifying its emphasis on the mid-thirteenth to the mid-to late fourteenth centuries, when documentary sources show opus anglicanum – ‘English work’ – was highly esteemed, especially in ecclesiastical circles throughout Europe.