January review

A month into 2011 already. How time flies! It's been a busy month too, with loads of interesting things going on. I think we surpassed ourselves in terms of exhibitions and museum visits!

Highlights:

• Canaletto at the National Gallery. A thoroughly enjoyable exhibition focusing on Canaletto and his rivals. Canaletto truly was the rich man's picture postcard painter - his paintings of Venice are exquisite and the composition is always excellent (even if it meant bending the truth slightly). It was interesting to note that he wasn't the first to fill that role, as painters such as Luca Carlevarijs had been painting vedute of Venice for years before him. The rival who really stood out to me was Francesco Guardi, one of the last painters of the classical Venetian School. His work really captured the fading grandeur of Venice and seemed to portray Venice as she is now (he was painting around the 1760s). I especially adored how he turned the emphasis from Venice out towards the lagoon itself (becoming almost Turner-esque).
  
  
• Gauguin at Tate Modern. This was a mammoth exhibition - 11 rooms in total - looking at the themes and mythology in Gauguin's work. It was very hard work - far too many people allowed in at any one time and rather poorly curated. Much of the information seemed to be stuffed into corners, or (in the case of sculptures & carvings) hidden in a random location on the wall. As I found out from a friend later, the audio guide had excellent information but I don't really expect to pay out more cash after paying £13 for entry in the first place. Westminster Abbey and the Queen's Gallery include your audio guide as part of the ticket price, which makes much more sense! Anyway, depite that rant, the exhibition was well-worth attending. I had seen some of Gauguin's work before ("Vision of the Sermon" in particular) and the bold, vivid colours had stuck in my mind. However, I did find some of the paintings a bit menacing with their strange characters lurking in the background! One of my favourite things was the two rooms with photographs, books and other paraphernalia, which served to put Gauguin's work into context with the time in which he was painting. I left the exhibition wanting to know more about him, regardless of how arrogant and morally dubious as he seemed!
  
  
• High Society at the Wellcome Collection. This must be the most popular exhibition I've been to at the Wellcome Collection - it was heaving! Something to do with the subject matter no doubt - mind-altering drugs in history and culture. Starting with the discovery of these drugs and their effects (loads of written accounts of self-experimentation), the exhibition progressed right through the 19th century drug trade to the changing attitudes of today. I was fascinated to discover how much the British were involved in the opium trade - the East India Company had opium plantations and sold to Chinese smugglers, despite opium being illegal in China at the time!
  
  
• Our first members evening at The British Museum and an opportunity to view galleries after-hours. Bliss! This evening was focused around the current Book of the Dead exhibition, which we went to see before Christmas (excellent but really needs two visits). We spent some time in the Egyptian sculpture court and listened to a curator talking about how they can date stelae by identifying features unique to the artisan who carved the hieroglyphs - so clever! To round off the evening, there was a lecture by the curator of the Book of the Dead exhibition, which I wish I had seen before we went, as it was such a good introduction to the subject matter. I felt the member evenings really do make the cost of membership worthwhile, and I can't wait until the next one!
  
  
• A members only visit to the Herbarium at Kew Gardens. This was a really fascinating insight into some of the behind-the-scenes work at Kew. The Herbarium was founded in 1853 to store dried plant specimens that were collected to be used to assist in identification and research. It still receives thousands of specimens every year and has staff dedicated to preserving and cataloguing them. One of the highlights was seeing specimens collected by Charles Darwin (in the photo above) and David Livingstone - it's amazing to think how different the world was when they were collected!
  

The Real Van Gogh at the RA

On Saturday we finally got around to visiting “The Real Van Gogh: the artist and his letters” exhibition at the Royal Academy. As the title suggests, the exhibition focused on Van Gogh’s many letters displayed alongside artworks tracing his progression as an artist.

One of the first things I noticed was his early works were so different to what we envisage when we think of Van Gogh. They were pen and ink works, which he used to practise perspective and, in some cases, I felt that the sketches in his letters were better realised than the actual artworks. He progressed to working on figures, especially country people, with limited success. It was when the artist began, at the suggestion of his brother, to work with colour and a more impressionist style that his work began to come into its own. The vibrant colours and textures of his still-lifes made me want to reach out and run my hand over the canvas, especially his “Still life with basket and six oranges”. (above) It was at this stage that he began to pair blue and orange so effectively as he did in his paintings of sunflowers.

The final few rooms centred on the artist’s landscapes painted in the last years of his life, when his mental state was deteriorating. It was so obvious that Van Gogh had a great love of the countryside and I couldn’t help but feel that he really did find peace in the pastoral. The cool blues and greens of his “Olive Trees” and the swirling leaves of “Cypresses” were two of my favourites in the whole exhibition. The last room, which included his last, unsent letter to his brother (carried on him the day he shot himself), showed an artist at the peak of his creative genius. At this time, he was painting more than a canvas a day including the beautiful “Ears of Wheat” and “Hospital at Saint-Remy”.

The pairing of Van Gogh’s letters with the associated artworks really did give an opportunity to understand the artist as a person. Even with my rusty knowledge of french, I could get an idea of the concerns in his life – even down to him finding a restaurant where he could eat for 1 franc. I genuinely felt that he was concerned about being a burden to his brother (who was his patron) and it was this that lead to his suicide. I felt he was an incredibly intelligent person fighting with inner demons at a time in which there was nobody qualified to help him.

I think this exhibition has to be one of my favourites of all the art exhibitions I have visited while living in London. I left with a new found respect for an artist who I previously associated with sunflowers and madness. Seeing the actual paintings allowed me to appreciate the vibrant colours and textures more than I ever could looking at pictures in a book. It is almost unbelieveable that Van Gogh produced so much art (over 900 paintings) in less than 10 years. In many ways, it was only to be expected that he burned out and was reaped when he was ripe (a symbolism inherent in many of his paintings).

Green beginnings

These new little beings are bringing me much joy at the moment. I planted tomato, sweet pepper, basil and coriander seeds and only the sweet peppers have failed to materialise so far. I can't escape the happiness I feel when I see the first little shoots peeping through the soil, and I always forget just how fast they grow! I tidied out last year's (very dead) tomato plants from the balcony yesterday, as I am sure it will time to put them outside before I know it.

Good weekend on the whole. Visited the Darwin's Big Idea exhibition at the Natural History Museum on Saturday. We really must remember to go to these things before the final few days - it was heaving! It was well worth the slow trawl round though. Loads of good, interesting exhibits and I finally got to see Darwin's finches!

Yesterday, as well as balcony tidying, I started learning Spanish. I'm trying to get a good handle on the basics before we go to Peru. I also wanted to brush up on my language skills and give me something to work at over the next few months. It's really good fun! I'm using this and LiveMocha, which seem to work well together. It would be nice to have someone to learn with, but I'll have to be content chattering away to myself for now!

Hats and hooping

I always seems to be about three days behind in getting these entries written. I need to learn to write shorter posts I think!

G's parents came to visit this weekend and a good time was had by all. His Mum arrived on Saturday with a bottle of wine and a beautiful bunch of spring flowers from their garden, which got things off to a good start. They went off to an exhibition at Excel, leaving G and I to build one of our new CD/DVD towers. We were meant to be meeting at the V&A to go to the Hats exhibition, but in the end G's Mum and I decided to go on Sunday. On Saturday evening, we went out for a lovely meal at the Telegraph pub. It meant I was out of the house for Earth Hour, which felt like a slight cop-out!

On Sunday, G's Mum and I went to see "Hats: An Anthology by Stephen Jones" at the V&A. I adore hats and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I learned that there is a difference between millinery and hat-making. Millinery is more conceptual and one-off, whereas hat-making is your bog-standard factory produced top hat or baseball cap. There were some fantastic items on display including hats worn by Dita von Teese, Margot Fonteyne and the Queen.

This week has been a bit odd. I had a real low on Monday but I'm feeling ok at the moment. As retail therapy, I ordered a hula-hoop and hoopdance DVD as treat. One of my goals for this year is to learn hoopdance, so this is a good start. In typical London style, most of the classes seem to be in parts of London that aren't easy for me to get to, or clash with my ATS class. I'm honestly not sure if I have enough room at home to hoop properly but I can give it a try. Hopefully, I don't damage too much!

Crafty Weekends

This weekend was a bit craft-centric on the whole.

On Saturday, Rhian and I went to the Stitch and Craft Show at Excel. Getting there turned out to be an adventure in itself. We got on the wrong DLR train and ended up at “West Silvertown”, along with many other confused looking crafters. I’m sure it is somewhere but it looked like an industrial wasteland to us. It was easily remedied though and we got to Excel eventually. It was my first time on the DLR and I’m still a bit dubious about the whole driverless train thing. It felt like being on a model railway!

Anyway, the show was a bit disappointing in terms of papercrafting goodies. Not a bit of Basic Grey in sight :o( I did, however, invest in a new corner rounder (I’ve worn the other one out – ahem) and some double sided sticky tape. I still enjoyed myself and it was lovely to see Rhian. She kept trying to get a picture of me with Dawn Bibby in it. I have to say though, as much as I am not a fan of Dawn’s work, she is gorgeous. The TV does her no favours.

As I got back to the flat reasonably early in the afternoon, Graeme and I then went to an architecture exhibition at the V&A. It was called “Over the threshold” and was looking at housing design, particularly the exterior and how the building promoted interaction with the community and environment. It was quite interesting actually and it was nice and short, so my attention didn’t wane.

Saturday night was a Battlestar Galactica fest. It was a struggle to pull ourselves away and go to bed (which really is saying something).

Sunday was dedicated to working on my team CJ for UKS. I’m really pleased with how it’s all turned out. Now, all I have to do is work on my own entry and it’s ready for posting!

The past from the air.

Graeme and I went to see “The Past from the Air” exhibition at the British Museum today. Typically, we had left it to the last minute as it finishes today, so it was really busy. It's an exhibition of Georg Gerster's work (http://www.georggerster.com), which concentrates on his photos of ancient sites. I love his work in general and I would love to be able to take photographs like his. Taking photos of these places from above just gives you the ability to appreciate the site as a whole and see them in context of their surroundings.

One thing that struck me was the impact that both humanity and the environment were having on the sites. Some of them were being farmed on, while others were disappearing under the sand dunes. It's odd that it seems ok for nature to reclaim the land, but if humanity is destroying the site then that's wrong.