Strictly come endurance dancing! Marathon hoofers bring back the age of week-long epics | Art and design

Marathon Dance Relief, the latest intriguing work by Nicole Wermers, focuses on the Depression-era craze for endurance dancing competitions, mainly in the US in the 1920s and 30s, where cavorting couples put themselves through brutal, sometimes week-long contests in the hope of winning prizes equivalent to a year’s salary, if they could be the last … Read more

‘I feel as though I’ve been in chains’: the bittersweet life of lovers rock legend Mari’ Pierre | Reggae

In December 1978, Marie Pierre was at No 1 in the UK reggae chart with the lovers rock classic Walk Away, a beautiful tearstained lament on a troubled relationship. Her 1979 debut album Love Affair, powered by another enduring scene song in Choose Me, remained one of Trojan’s best-selling albums well into the 1980s; Pierre, … Read more

From acid house to ancient rites: Jeremy Deller’s enormous, collaborative, unsellable art | Jeremy Deller

On a frosty bright-blue day in February 2024, Jeremy Deller was in Dundee, examining severed heads. “How can anyone not be fascinated by a head?” he said. Deller is an elfin figure, 5ft 5 on a good day, a low-key, unintimidating presence. The only giveaway to his identity as an artist was his slightly dandyish … Read more