Cathy's Art Diary

Glamorous exhibition at the London Fashion and Textile Museum of the work of the designers Normal Hartnell and Hardy Amies who both designed for the Queen at various stages in their careers looking at how they established London as a centre of couture at the start of the 20th century. I would have liked a bit more context with the outfits but the clothes were beautifully displayed and it was lovely that you could get so close and they were not behind glass. It was easy to see the detail on the items both the classically plain the luscious embroidery. I would say though that everything would have looked even more glamorous if the gallery had not smelly so strongly of curry! It was quite distracting!   The 1950s section was the most elegant including a beautiful copper coloured strapless cocktail dress. I also liked a funky 60s mini coat in pale blue a gold. There was also a nice section of hats by Frederick Fox including a copy of the Queen’s silver jubilee bell ha...

Interesting exhibition at the Saatchi Gallery looking at the art which came out of the Moscow underground from about 1960 to 1990. I would have liked more explanation with these works as my Russian history was not good enough to put the works in context. Also I didn’t understand some of the section heading such an analytical art. I think this would have helped me appreciate the works more. I liked the super real large paintings near the end by Vitaly Komar and Alexander Lemamid such as the Stalin in front of a mirror. Also the works by Illya Kabakov with rosettes of the colours used in the picture stuck on to them.   Reviews Evening Standard  

Exhibition of works by contemporary Russian artists at the Saatchi Gallery. Oh dear I think I started by not understanding the title as I found most of the works quite depressing. I liked the way they were shown and allowed to stand on their own without explanation but maybe in my case a bit of explanation was needed! There were interesting vertigo inducing large photographs of people sitting in the windows of high rise buildings by Vikenti Nilin. However I found the photos of the homeless by Boris Mikhailov moving but profoundly depressing. I did however love the large townscapes by Yalery Koshlyakov particularly the one of the Paris Opera painted on torn up cardboard boxes. Despite the fact it looks quite coarsely painted they worked from a distance and close to. Reviews Times Observer    

Lovely small exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of works by Humphrey Ocean. The works were all of people who had visited his studio and had been done as rapid painted sketches usually taking less than a hour. All the sitters were on the same chair and some help a mug of a cigarette. They were all the same format which made you look more carefully at the person and how they sat. The exhibition felt like you had walking round a group of friends at a party. Delightful!  

S uper exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery focusing on portraits by the photographer and artist Man Ray. The exhibition was arranged chronologically grouping works by where Man Ray was living at the time. My favourite section was for 1920s Paris a period I keep falling over at the moment. There was a wonderful picture of Ernest Hemmingway in a woolly jumper! He also took the publicity shots of James Joyce when Ulysses came out. I found it a wonderful insight into a group of people. I wasn’t quite sure how Thomas Beecham crept in but it was a good photo! I also liked the section on Lee Miller and the inclusion of fashion photography as well as straight portraits. Of course I liked the Virginia Woolf and do wonder what that sitting was like! It was nice that there were shots of Picasso throughout the show from the 1920s to 1970s. The exhibition introduced me to people I hadn’t heard of through ones I had and off to research a few of them now!   ...

Third session in a six week course at the National Gallery on Renaissance painting which focused this week on the role of women with the course tutor Sian Williams. The first session looked at how women were women were depicted in art of the time either giving them a saint or sinner role. It looked at how both religious and secular art used these two themes. It then looked at women as commissioners of art talking a Crivelli on the gallery’s collection as an example. It was commissioned by Oradea Becchetti for her husbands funeral chapel. The second session looked a women who were patrons of art of course looking in some detail at the wonderful Isabella D’Este and her studio. It also mention Eleanor of Toledo wife of Cosimo de Medici who paid for the Pitti Palace with her own money. Then we ended with women artists which was fascinating. I’d not realised that Tintoretto had a daughter who was an artist and that Van Eyck sister Margaret was a painter. We also learnt about So...

Small exhibition at the National Gallery as a partner to their “Through American Eyes” exhibition which I went to last week. It features works dating between 1700 and 1900 and drew on the Gere Collection which is on permanent loan to the gallery and from their own collection. These were all worked out of doors. I have to admit I found some of the works quite dull particularly the rather dark pictures of tress and mountains at the start. I did however like the section on Rome and of course the lovely Thomas Jones “Wall in Naples”. I always forget how small it is.

Super course at the National Gallery looking at  Velazquez’s Rokeby Venus led by Karly Allen one of the National Gallery lecturers. The structure of the course was excellent setting the painting in its historic context looking at what Velazquez was doing at this time and where has was in his career as well as who owned the painting over the years. We then went to sit round the picture itself and look at its finish and get an idea of our own emotional responses to it. After a quick coffee we put this picture in its art historic context looking at other reclining female nudes plus the genre of Venus at her toilet. I particularly enjoyed this section as I am fascinated by how artists are influenced by earlier generations. It was also strange to think of Rubens and Velazquez going round the Spanish royal collection together looking at the Titians. There was then a session on responses to the picture since it entered the public domain n 1906 including the attack by a suffrage...

An exhibition of photographs by  Ajamu at the Guildhall Art Gallery. The pictures were portraits of under-35 Black British-born LGBTQ people from many walks of life described as the movers and shakers of a generation. The best juxtaposition was a barrister next to a phsycogeographer. They were concentrated well cropped images with strong faces many taken using 19th century techniques. My favourite was Lasana Shabazz with a wonderful shrugging expression.

Small exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery looking at the British photographers and personalities who admired her and worked with Marilyn Monroe. It had groups of photographs from various shoots with British photographers bringing together original photographs and examples of where the photographs were used. There was a nice section with photographs of when she came to the UK to film the Prince and the Showgirl including a lovely shot of fans at the gates of the house where she was living. Most bizarre was a photo of Marilyn with Edith Sitwell a real crashing together of worlds.

Small exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of Tudor portraits which have been examined recently as part of the Making Art in Tudor Britain project. In the case of two of the pictures x-raying has shown religious pictures underneath the portraits. These were hung with loans from other collections to show what the paintings underneath may have looked like. Most amusing was a portrait of Walsingham with a flagellation underneath!  Reviews Guardian

Display at the National Portrait Gallery bringing together portraits of Henry VII and Catherine of Aragon. The portrait of Catherine has only recently been identified as her and has been cleared and conserved. Most interesting was the fact the frame has been restored to how it would have looked and was quite unusual to our eye with a painted red and gold bands. This was an nice idea but the pictures weren’t drawing much attention on the day I went as they were just 2 pictures away from Richard III who has become a minor celebrity in recent weeks! Reviews Guardian

Small exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery of the work of Fred Daniels, a pioneer of British still and portrait photography. The works were mainly form the 1940s and focused on his work with filmmakers filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger known as the Archers. Subjects included Vivien Leigh and Lesley Howard. I was particularly amused to see how attractive James Mason was when younger.

Second session in a six week course at the National Gallery on Renaissance painting which focused on how paintings were produced and how science can help us find this out. The first lecture was given by Gill Hart, Head of Adult Learning at the gallery and looked at under drawings and their role. There was nice emphasis on Raphael, linking to the second talk, and examining different pictures and infra red scans of them to look at Raphael’s technique. I loved the fact the pounced cartoon for the galleries Allegory still exists. The second talk was by Ashok Roy, Head of Collections at the gallery, who talked about the work he had done in the galleries laboratory when he was head of science to help to authenticate Raphael’s “Madonna of the Pinks” by analysing the paint. It was interesting to hear that he had been unable to take samples from the picture as the gallery did not own it at the time and had to use others methods instead. I was also interested to hear when different pigme...

Nice exhibition of oil sketches by Frederick Church at the National Gallery. These sketches were made out of doors either in their own right or as studies for larger works. They are painted about the time of the American Civil War and show a quiet of pride and patriotism in the landscape. I loved one of a sunset over the Hudson River in New York as it had a wonderful contrast between the deep orange sky and black roof tops in the foreground. The sketches were hung alongside a full scale work “Niagara Falls from the American Side” to show the relationship between the sketches and finished works. The exhibition gave a good view of an artists working methods.

Small exhibition at Somerset House of photographs and models by Photographer Dan Tobin Smith and designer Rachel Thomas. The models were imaginative polyester buildings which they then photograph as if they were real buildings. The images take on a surreal quality particularly the one which included a big nose. There was a sort of odd 2D 3D dialogue going on between the models and the photographs, the models themselves being £D and the photos 2D, but the quality of the image gave the picture an almost 3D effects. My favourite was a large photograph which looked like an island cityscape including its reflection in the surface surrounding it.  

First session in a six week course at the National Gallery on Renaissance painting. This is module 2 of a new series which began in the autumn called “Stories of Art”. I wasn’t able to do the first module but have made time for this one. This first session looked at power and patronage and was led by the course tutor Sian Walters and picking examples from the galleries own collection.   The first lecture was an overview of the period picking out the main themes with an emphasis on patronage. This is a period I know well but along with being a reminder for me it did also introduce new things such as an important patron from Sienna, Pandolfo Petrucci, who I had not come across before. The second lecture looked at Vasari and his lives of the painters examining why he was biased towards Florentine artists and what effect this has had on art history. It also looked at what a good source it is on contemporary works. San took as an example Pontormo’s Joseph paintings for the Borghe...

Annual fair selling prints and watercolours held this year at the Science Museum. This is always a lovely exhibition to walk around with a glass of wine in hand and see what is on the market and just generally add to your knowledge. The special display this year “The Conquest of the Skies” was from the Science Museum’s collection and featured works on ballooning. There was a lovely selection ranging from 19 th century cartoon to World War I and II images. Many stalls also had featured displays and my favourites were Abbott and Holder’s watercolours by Albert Heim, a World War I German war artist and Scheidman’s selection of linocuts by Kyffin Williams. The talk of the show were the super realistic drawings by Kelvin Okafor which were getting quite a lot of press coverage. They were technically brilliant having the finish of a photograph but being drawings but I found them slightly clinical because of that. I did weaken and buy! I fell for a self portrait by Dorothy...