Jonathan Pryce was humorous, Peter O’Toole capricious, Liv Ullman secretly female and Jude Law memorably Speedo-clad – onscreen pontiffs have come in all forms

Everything about the papacy is cinematic – especially picking a new one, as shown in the wildly popular movie Conclave, with Ralph Fiennes as an unwilling contender for the top job. There is the mystery, the ritual, the vestments; the spectacle of a lone, fragile human being poised over an abyss of history and good and evil; the elevation of one flawed man to a position of supreme authority, an exaltation whose parallel to the crucifixion is sensed but not acknowledged.

Discussing the onscreen representation of the pope in Conclave would risk the blasphemy of spoilerism but there have been many popes on screen, some cheekily fictional, many factual. Many a heavyweight British thesp has turned in a gamey cameo as some hooded-eyed Renaissance pontiff. Peter O’Toole was the lizardly and capricious Paul III in TV’s The Tudors (2007), presiding over a simperingly submissive 16th-century court of cardinals. Jeremy Irons was a small-screen Alexander VI in The Borgias (2011), a family member whose face radiated sensual refinement and hauteur.

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Holy balls of wool! From pointless paintings to emotionless snapshots, the once-controversial award tiptoes too earnestly across the minefield of today’s culture wars

Remember when controversy was fun? If not, that’s because you’re too young. But back in the 1990s, my child, Britain got itself in hilarious knots about conceptual art, the readymade and whether a pickled shark or elephant dung can be art, with the Turner prize as battleground. It was a culture war but with laughs, because no one’s identity was at stake and it wasn’t like Brian Sewell was going to become prime minister and have Rachel Whiteread jailed.

It is by embracing the earnestness of today’s high-stakes culture wars that the Turner prize has lost its edge, the art getting more careful as the ideologies loom larger. This year’s shortlist is the soppiest yet. Two of the artists nominated are painters. Painters, I ask you! This makes some sense of the shortlist announcement taking place on JMW Turner’s 250th birthday. But as painters go, do Mohammed Sami and Zadie Xa (who also creates bland installations) compare with the boldness of Mr Turner? Neither is pushing back the boundaries of what a painting might be, or redefining this art for the 21st century in scale, freedom, audacity.

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PC, PlayStation 5 (version played); Sandfall Interactive/Kepler Interactive
Boasting a unique world, challenging combat and great writing, this RPG has a lot going for it, if only it didn’t revel in its own mysteriousness so much

When we meet Clair Obscur’s protagonist Gustave, he’s getting ready to say goodbye to his ex-girlfriend, Sophie. Once a year the Paintress, a giant god-like woman visible from across the sea, wakes, paints a number on a large monolith, and in the peaceful town of Lumière, everyone whose age corresponds with the number dies. This process, called the Gommage, has shortened people’s lives for 67 years, and now it’s Sophie’s turn. Immediately after this heart-wrenching goodbye, Gustave and his adopted sister Maelle get ready to set sail as part of Expedition 33, on a journey to defeat the Paintress and end her gruesome cycle.

While stunningly beautiful, the continent you arrive at is no friendly place, and the path to the Paintress is filled with surreal monsters called Nevrons, which you fight in turn-based battles. Characters have a melee attack and a long-range attack, but most importantly, they have a large variety of unique skills including elemental magic attacks and strong attacks with multiple hits that have the chance to stun. Each member of your team has a special way of building up damage even further; Maelle for example uses a defensive, offensive or aggressive combat stance, inspired by fencing, while the magic that Lune wields builds up so-called stains that you can then spend to make other spells more powerful. Add to this long list of optional passive skills called Pictos, and soon you have a wide array of ways to enhance your characters. The interplay between building up action points to use skills, building up damage and defending is really interesting, and I enjoyed trying out different tactics, even as it meant that a lot of my time was spent in menus.

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In 1993, the Swedish artist had reached a dead end – so he burned all his work. Seeing the ashes inspired him to embark on an epic journey through the Indian wilderness, a Swedish cave – and now Britain

Drive north of Stockholm for an hour or so and, buried within woodland near the village of Vendel, you will come across the 200-year-old house where Gustaf Broms lives. There are no shops or even neighbours here – just trees, wild animals and a man making beguiling performance art videos. You shouldn’t, however, assume that Broms feels isolated.

“I don’t see it like that,” he says through a beaming smile. In the early 1990s, the Swedish artist moved to Kumaon in northern India, right near the border with western Nepal and Tibet. Compared with that, this place couldn’t be more accessible. “It’s easy enough to get on a bike if I need something,” he shrugs.

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During the latest in Howard Burton’s Masterpiece series, the art historian turns his low-tech but scholarly attention to Raphael’s interior decoration in the Vatican palace

Here is the latest in the series of high-minded, low-tech studies of Renaissance art history from Howard Burton, a theoretical physicist turned art historian, who has launched a series of films called, with admirable Ronseal-ness, Renaissance Masterpieces. Having already looked over Botticelli’s Primavera , Burton now turns to Raphael’s wall fresco in the Vatican palace, arguably the high point of the artist’s prodigious output and a work to rival Michelangelo’s Sistine chapel decorations.

Burton has already tackled The School of Athens as part of his mammoth survey of Raphael’s entire oeuvre, Raphael: A Portrait , but here he gets to drill down in considerable detail for the film’s 81-minute running time. Admittedly, the visuals are as rudimentary as Burton’s previous offerings – it looks like a glorified PowerPoint, with Burton’s sonorous commentary overlaid in unpunctuated voiceover – but as before, the tone works: Burton is scholarly without being dull, and clear without being obvious.

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The British-Nigerian artist explores colonialism and connection in his first major solo exhibition in Africa. Plus, a grime MC goes oyster farming

Hello and welcome to The Long Wave. Earlier this month I was in Antananarivo, Madagascar, where I checked out the British-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare’s first major solo exhibition in Africa. For this week’s newsletter I caught up with him about the landmark show, and learned a lot about the growing Malagasy art scene.

Madagascar is not a country that figures prominently in media – western or otherwise (beyond the children’s film ) – and as such it was difficult to know what to expect. I hadn’t imagined an opportunity to visit, and so Fondation H’s invitation to the capital to explore the art scene felt once in a lifetime. It was certainly a long way to travel for an exhibition: from London, with a stopover in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the journey topped 15 hours, though as soon as I landed in Madagascar I was instantly taken by its lush, grassy plains and mountainous topography.

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Nyweide began her career aged just six in Bella and went on to work on films including And Then Came Love, Margot at the Wedding and Noah

The actor Sophie Nyweide has died at the age of 24, her family has announced.

An online obituary gives no cause of death, but says Nyweide died on 14 April.

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Ralph Fiennes was Oscar-nominated for his role in the thriller which follows cardinals wrangling to replace a fictional pontiff after his death

The death of Pope Francis on 21 April led to an abrupt uptick in viewership of Conclave, Edward Berger’s thriller which depicts the events following the death of a fictional pope, and the cardinals wrangling to replace him.

The film, which won best picture at the Baftas earlier this year and was nominated for eight Oscars, is available on assorted streaming platforms worldwide. According to Luminate, which tracks streaming viewership, Conclave was viewed for about 1.8m minutes on 20 April, and 6.9m minutes the next day – an increase of 283%.

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London’s underground dance scene is increasingly funded by inherited wealth. From Mike Ashley’s son to a Tetra Pak heir, monied promoters explain their motivations

Nestled between Millwall FC stadium and an intersection of south London railway lines, the 350-capacity Venue MOT – once an actual MOT garage – is a cornerstone of the city’s underground music scene. But every Tuesday, owner Jan Mohammed gathers his staff at the bar and tells them how much money it has lost since the weekend.

Mohammed, a sculptor, started renting a nearby space to use as a studio more than a decade ago. With no residential neighbours and relatively low costs, he opened Venue MOT in 2018 based on simple intuition: “I thought music could thrive here,” he says. Despite the losses and Mohammed calling his operation a “comedy of errors”, it does. Time Out recently labelled Venue MOT the best nightclub in London and Jamie xx called it “one of the last places in London that feels genuinely free and DIY” after his 10-night residency last year with guests including Charli xcx and Daphni. Mohammed describes the club’s atmosphere as “DDS” – deep, dark and sweaty. Indomitable characters like him are the lifeblood of a financially unstable scene that must constantly adapt to licensing rules and urban redevelopment.

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