Cathy's Art Diary

Fabulous exhibition at the National Maritime Museum to mark the Queens Jubilee looking at how royalty have used the river Thames . It looked at how and why palaces were built along the river, how it was used for transport, how it was incorporated into great state occasions as well as private events and how the City of London has supported this. It covered from the Tudor period to the present day and was very sumptuous! I found it magical to see a picture from one of the dinner boxes at Vauxhall Gardens and items from the frost fairs. There was a wonderful changing panorama of maps and views of the river which I found fascinating as I have started to use the river to travel to work. Reviews Telegraph EveningStandard

  Small exhibition at the National Theatre of new works by Hilary Rosen.   Theses included interesting black and white prints of London including views of bridges, bright vibrant still lives and small dark pictures of loan stick figures. I liked the work but did find it a slightly hotch potch of styles. 

Book talk at the Charleston Festival  bringing together Fiona MacCarthy and Marina Warner. Fiona MacCarthy was talking about her biography of Burne-Jones, which is why I am including it in this blog! She gave an illustrated talk which was fascinating but I felt that she had overly focused the presentation to fit with the subject matter of the second speaker. Marina Warner was talking about her the Arabian Nights which looked at how the stories opened up ideas of magic in the West. I didn’t really feel that the two subjects fitted together. This is very usual for Charleston where speakers are usually matched beautifully to bring more out of each subject but in this case it didn’t work for me. 

Talk by Brian Sewell at Charleston Festival to mark the publication of the memoir of his early years “The Ousider”. However in typical Brian Sewell fashion he didn’t really talk about the book but more generally about life as an art critic, where he sees his work now, the current state of the art world and much more. Setting aside the fact that on at least three occasions he was very misogynistic, it was a virtuoso performance! He had most of the audience eating out of his hand and laughing out loud. The Q&A session was the most entertaining with comments on the recent David Hockney exhibition, what he feels about his current position at the evening standard and which recent exhibition he has enjoyed.

Fun exhibition at the Brighton Museum and Art Gallery to mark the Queen’s Jubilee of designer clothes featuring the Union Jack. It features clothes by Vivienne Westwood, Jasper Conrad and Barbour and includes very wearable times such as the limited edition Barbour jacket and the more exotic like the Westood tutu. I so wanted the Duchess of Cambridge to wear the dress pictured with this blog over the celebrations but sadly not. It would have shown a tasteful sense of humour. 

Exhibition at Brighton Museum and Art Gallery of new work by Julian Bell, Tom Hammick and Andrzej Jackowski three artists with strong links to Sussex. I liked Julian Bells work best as it was the most realist although I did find the work more striking from a distance that close up. I loved a large textural picture of a quarry and a compilation called Motherboard of small sketch of most of the works in the exhibition. I found Andrzej Jackowski work slightly lazy. It was a series of very rough drawings of the same interior with different combinations of objects in it. 

Interview with Annie Leibovitz as part of the Charleston Festival conducted by the director of Charleston Colin McKenizie. It focused on her new book “Pilgrimage” and complemented the exhibition in the gallery at Charleston which I reviewed in my previous post. She talked a little about how the project came about and talked us through a selection of the photographs not only saying what they were of but why and how she took them. The Q&A session was fascinating as she talked a bit about getting access to the houses she had used and the different attitudes of the curators of these small museums. At times I found her slightly hesitant in her speech but this just gave me the impression of someone who thinks through the view finder of a camera not words. A super event.  

Lovely little exhibition in the gallery at Charleston Farmhouse of recent work by the photographer Annie Leibovitz from her recent book “Pilgrimage”. Unusually the works do not include people but are mostly of places closely related to people mainly the houses of artists and writers. The project began by accident in a visit of Emily Dickinson house and includes pictures from Charleston itself and nearby Monks House, home of Virginal and Leonard Woolf. The pictures were very peaceful and despite being without people are all about them. I found it almost a study in how we are remembered by what we leave behind us.