Cathy's Art Diary

Exhibition of photographs at the National Portrait Gallery tracing the history of British press photography in the Fleet Street years from the turn of the century to 1986. It looks at the different roles of staff photographers and agencies and has a number of photos with photographers in them including one for about 1910 of an incident at Downing Street with a photographer in the middle. There was a good section on how different people or causes have used press photographs to their advantage such as the Suffragettes and Winston Churchill at the siege of Sidney Street. I liked the more odd ball pictures such as members of Broadstairs Council ready for gas drill showing a collection of gentlemen in gas masks looking like refugee monsters from Doctor Who or Lord Hailsham swimming at Brighton. Reviews Daily Telegraph FT Observer

This annual exhibition and award at the National Portrait Gallery aims to promote the very best in contemporary portrait painting. This year it has been opened to all artists abolishing the upper age limit but introducing an extra prize for artists aged between 18 and 30. Although each picture is decided on merit, inevitably each year themes do seem to appear. This year seemed to have a good selection of pictures focusing on age. The winner “Michael Simpson” by Paul Emsley is a large portrait of an older man, in fact an artist from him home town. It is so big and so finely painted that every crevice in the face is visible and the whole face seems to look out of the black background towards you. Another picture entitles “Bevan Boy” showed the artist, Philip Renforth’s, father who had been a Bevan Boy in the war. He now had a face of great dignity. Another theme seemed to be paintings of not just anonymous sitters but sitters who were not actually know by the painter. “Commuter” by John ...

Exhibition at the Queen’s House, Greenwich of 200 works in the National Maritime Museum’s art collections. Arranged in a slightly off order I think the aim is to show the different collections owned by and looked after by the Museum. Collections such as that of Eric Palmer, a soldier, restaurateur and bon viver, who, following research on one Netherlandish seascape he bought began a full scale study of Flemish and Dutch marine pictures or the collections of the Ministry of Defence which include pictures from Cook’s 2nd and 3rd trips to the Pacific. The collections includes pictures by Turner, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Hogarth and William Orpen. Even though the pictures are of one subject they are amazingly varied. My favourite room contained works chosen by the War Artists Advisory Commission and included pictures done by World War II war artists. Most moving were pictures by John Worsley, a POW in a naval prison camp Morlag (0). These are painted on bed sheets as he had no canvas. My fa...

Small exhibition at the National Maritime Museum looking at how sailors’ uniforms, particularly those of the Royal Navy have influence fashion ever since Queen Victoria had a sailor suit made for the four year of Price of Wales. It starts with early C20th bathing costumes, moves through theatrical and movie costumes and then looks at haute couture coming right through to Kenzo designs for 2007. It was particularly nice to see the aforementioned Princes sailor suit next to the Winterhalter portrait of him wearing it. Reviews Times

Small exhibition in the Sunley Room at the National Gallery which has already been on tour to Bristol's City Museum and Art Gallery and the Laing Art Gallery, in Newcastle upon Tyne. It takes the opportunity too look at a bit of social history, how work and leisure have changed over the last 4000 years, and show this through works of art from the National Gallery’s own collection and loans from other galleries. It was a good idea and done well but somehow left me wanting more! As it is such a small space it could almost have been worth doing two separate exhibitions to give more depth, however it was good to see the links between the themes. Works such as the acrylic sculpture “The Traveller” by Duane Hanson showed how leisure can actually be hard work. There was the inevitable Lowry given the theme was work and a Ford Maddox Brown picture “Work” showing the sentimental view of the working classes in Victorian England. The most extraordinary piece was a roll of material from 1992 ...

Short talk at the National Gallery on “The Origin of the Milky Way” by Jacopo Tintoretto in Room 9 given by Leslie Primo. Nice interlude after work looking at this picture and its iconography. Also covered a bit on the life of Tintoretto. I particularly liked the story of how he entered a competition to decorate the ceiling in the Council Chamber in Venice and won it by sneaking in one evening and just putting his entry up in situ then donating it to the council. This picture was painted for the Holy Roman Emperor, Rudolf II and shows the moment where the baby Hercules is placed on the sleeping Juno’s breast to feed and give him immortality. However she wakes and the spilt milk forms the Milky Way. The speaker was excellent and drew quite a crowd by the end of the session and signed off with “That was the High Renaissance and this is Tintoretto. Thank you and goodnight!”

The featured artist this month at the Abbott and Holder Gallery in Museum Street is Duncan Grant with works possibly for the Cambridge production of Aristophanes 'The Birds' in 1923/24 and some recumbent male figures. Being a big Bloomsbury fan it was good to see these works and realise that a line block print which I bought a few years ago relates to “The Birds” pictures. Although these pictures were too expensive for me I did fall for a small drawing by Leonard Leslie Brooke for a illustration for the poem “Mr and Mrs Spikky Sparrow” by Edward Lear and two very small, honest not much bigger than a postage stamp, sketches by William or Evelyn de Morgan. Now where will I hang them?

Exhibition at the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace of Italian art in the Royal Collection bringing together 90 paintings and 85 drawings from royal palaces. Galleries of paintings focused on Florence, Rome, Venice and Northern Italy in the C16th and the Baroque. Another gallery side gallery had three rooms of drawings looking at the different techniques. Incorporated through the exhibition was furniture, sculpture and books from the collection. There was some focus on how the items entered the Royal Collection looking in particular at the collecting of Charles I including how it was dispersed on his death and how many items were required on the Restoration. It was a lovely opportunity to see some great works of art. My particular favourites were two drawings by Michelangelo as a gift for Tommaso de’ Cavalieri one of “A children’s bacchanal” and one of “The Fall of Phaeton”. The best painting was the self portrait by Artemisia Gentileschi which was shown next to works by her father ...

"Art at the Airport" is an initiative at Edinburgh airport to showcase the work of Scottish artists and is located at the departure lounge at gate 12. The current exhibition is called "On the Water" and featured seascapes and river scenes. I particularly liked the work of Paul Bartlett, who does birds on water and Hugh Murdoch who concentrates on sunsets over water. All works are for sale. This was a nice chance in a busy environment to see some original works of art. I'd been on business in Edinburgh, so despite the fact the festival was on, this was my only chance to look at art. Quite frustrating considering all the great things which seemed to be going on up there !