Cathy's Art Diary

Colourful exhibition at Waddington Custot examining how Patrick Caulfield looked at light and shade across various times of day. These featured Caulfield’s signature style of flat-coloured planes with hard black outlines using domestic items such as lamp shades and wine glasses such as “Still Life: Father’s Day” from 1975, a pipe. Tulips, a lamp and ivy. I loved the 3D effect of “Wall Lights” from 1988 and the four screen-prints “Interior: Morning, Noon, Evening and Night” which showed the same scene in different colourways. Closed 15 November 2019

Calm exhibition at the Mayor Gallery of series of paintings by Josip Vaništa. This series consisted of a straight line crossing a monochrome surface which the press release said represented “striving for infinity” and they did have a sense that the line would carry on for ever. The pictures were hung beautifully so the lines matched around the room with just the colours changing not the image or levels. I found these works had a sense of focus and calm despite the fact other works were being examined for a future show round the bottom of the walls. Closes 29 November 2019

Stunning exhibition at Flowers Gallery of new work by Tai Shan Schierenberg. There were just a few large pictures in this show by a former winner of the BP Portrait Award which examined ideas of masculinity in Western society. They grabbed you with their size and colour as you entered the gallery. I loved “No Man Left Behind” a study of two men supporting a slumped figure. I assume he was a drunk on a stag night but it could be a runner in a race. All the figures have a well caught, naturalistic stance. Other pictures showed footballers as he was artist in residence at West Bromwich Albion for a Channel   4 series. My favourite piece was a striking double portrait (140 x 200 cm) called “Brothers”, two young men sitting one behind the other and facing in different directions with a blue bookcase behind.  Closed   23 November 2019

Beautiful exhibition at the Redfern Gallery of landscape paintings by David Inshaw. Inshaw started as a pop artist but moved into a more realistic style and joined the Brotherhood of Ruralism with Peter Blake. The pictures have a feeling of Paul Nash, lovely views which just edge into a surrealistic feel.   He is best known for his picture “Badminton Game”,   acquired by the Tate in 1971. I think I was partly drawn to these as a number of them showed the countryside I grew up in and I loved the picture shown here of Silbury Hill from the air. There was also a stunning picture of a bird flying over the Marlborough Downs.   There was also a lovely set of large, meticulously drawn trees.   Closed 29 November 2019

Fabulous exhibition at the Royal Academy focusing on Lucian Freuds self-portraits. This show not only examined how Freud viewed himself but also, as it was arranged chronologically, was a great way to show how his style and technique changed over the years. His pictures began as smooth, finely drawn works and end as the wonderful impasto studies with which we now associate him. It was curated by David Dawson, Freud’s last studio assistant, and felt comprehensive as it even included letters with sketched self-portraits and lots of pictures from private collections. The pictures were, of course, wonderful. I don’t know his earlier work that well but loved the rather flat style. I loved a detailed drawing of a street scene with a beautifully drawn wall and lamp with just the top of his head sneaking into the scene. It was nice to see a sketch of “Hotel Bedroom” from 1954 as well as the picture itself. Also to see three pictures from 1963 reunited for the first time since then...

Charming exhibition at Now Gallery of photographs by Nadia Huggins. The pictures were large scale and showed adolescent males swimming in the seas around St Vincent and Grenadines.   I loved the underwater pictures where the bodies and water intermingled. In the commentary Huggins says they record “snippets of vulnerability and moments of abstraction”.   The works looked lovely in this space. Closed 17 November 2019

Disappointing exhibition at the National Gallery illuminating their “Virgin of the Rocks” painting. I’d hoped this would offer something new however it felt very thin and seemed to make a few points in a large space. The space was divided into five galleries each one focusing on an aspect of the picture however all the points, except maybe the last, could have been made with one information board. I’m afraid it was a classic case of style over substance. The first room, shown here, looked at the role of landscape in the picture using large photographs of the Alps, broken up by a metal screen of boxes with quotes from Leonardo on them, some in his mirror writing which was then reflected by the side of the box if you got the angle right. The second room looked at his use of light and shade and did have quite clever light boxes with white objects in them where you could alter the light source and see what difference it made to how it looked. Interesting but once you’d don...

Interesting selling fair at Woolwich Royal Arsenal specialising in prints and featuring a number of galleries. It’s been a couple of years since I went to this fair and it has moved to a bigger venue which gave more space for a couple on larger installations, one of which is shown here, and a smart bar. There was a good selection of work but I spotted a trend for amusing works but I’m not sure the jokes would last. The Eames stall had some lovely quality work including a large David Hockney, a Tracey Emin and an Antony Gormley, which my friend bought! Other highlights included Alison Lambert’s portraits, a picture of two girls in a wood by Margaret Ashman in gentle pastel shades and Anna Maria Pacheco’s Paula Rego like series of prints. Closed  10 November 2019

Sweet exhibition at Southwark Cathedral of pictures of the cathedral cat, Doorkins Magnificat, by Celia Pike. The cat is a stray that has moved into the cathedral and now features on some of the merchandise there. Celia Pike says she was inspired by the light falling on his fur in different ways around the building. The show was in a couple of display cases in the corridor and featured some lovely delicate watercolours along with sketches and some of her artist materials.  He certainly is an excellent model.

Strange exhibition at the Science Gallery looking at anxiety and how an anxious state can fuel positive action. I admit I’d already done a lot that day but I found this show difficult to understand and instead of enlightening me on the topic of anxiety it seemed to bring it on. There were some interesting installations blending contemporary art and science but I found them quite confused and difficult to understand. I liked Alice May Williams’ paintings based on the colours of women’s football strips and using supportive phrases from coaches and Cian McConn’s “Some People Have No Shoes” which lists observations of others which changed his self-criticism of himself.   I like the work shown which by Sarah Howe which used mirrors and blocks to reveal and hide videos of repeated gestures of anxiety. It induced a feeling of confusion and a desire to work out where images were coming from. Closes 19 January 2020

Unusual exhibition at the Imperial War Museum looking at the role of music in conflict. The show focused on four stories from different eras, Nazi Germany in the 1930s, Northern Ireland in the 1970s, Serbia in the 1990s and present day Mali. I was fascinated by the story of the Frankfurt Hot Club, a swing club founded by Horst Lippmann which played jazz records, seen as degenerate by the regime, and forming his own band. I found it very moving to listen to a recording of them. I also liked the section on the role of the Good Vibrations record shop in Belfast during the troubles which was visited by members of both sectarian sounds and promoted Northern Irish music at a time when it might have become to too difficult to go to concerts and events. There was an excellent room at the end playing all the music and it was wonderful to hear Teenage Kicks booming out from it. The 1990s example was the B92 radio station in Serbia which continued to broadcast news through th...

Lovely exhibition at the Imperial War Museum looking at the evacuation of objects from the museum in the Second World War. The show looked not only at how the objects were evacuated but also in detail at the choices made in what was saved and how that might be different if we were deciding today. I was amused to see that some of the objects were returned to the army to be used again! 280 pictures and 350 albums of photographs were evacuated, just 7% of the art collection at the time. The photographs were later returned to be used in military training. A lot of Orpens and Laverys were saved as each had their own gallery in the museum at the time. There were no works but female artists saved but a number showing women’s work in the First World War were saved. There was also a section on how the National Gallery was used in the war with the display of one masterpiece each month and the Gallery had lent a Rembrandt which had featured. The gallery lost one picture in the wa...

Fascinating exhibition at the Imperial War Museum looking at how war damages cultural heritage. It was a smaller show than I’d imagined but was packed full of stories and picked up stories between displays. It looked at why heritage is targeted both to destroy civilisations and to undermine morale.  In the destruction section there was a display on how the Nazi’s hoarded and stole art but in the restoration section it looked at the work of the Monument Men who worked to reclaim the stolen art at the end of the war. That display included a picture of Ann Olivier who I had the privilege to meet many times at Charleston Farmhouse. The picture is of a preserved book from the Louvian university library which was bombed by the Germans in the First World War, an act which backfired as the books were preserved like relics and was used as pro-war propaganda in England. Coventry was used as an example of the Baedeker bombings where the German’s targeted British cities in th...

Timely installation at the Imperial War Museum to mark the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Two pieces of the wall were erected outside the museum. One was painted by the French artist Thierry Noir who lived in a squat near the Berlin Wall and began painting on it in 1984, the first artist to systematically paint long stretches of it. He invited street artist STIK to paint the other piece and together they show two figures facing towards each other. Noir described is as the 'past engaging with the present'. The work looked striking. The volunteer guides with it were happy to talk to me about it when they saw me lingering and one shared memories of being a reporter is Berlin at the time. It was a shame it wasn’t up for longer. Closed 1 December 2019

Disappointing exhibition  at Tate Modern of new and older work by Olafur Eliasson. I realise I might be in a minority of one in being disappointed in this show. I think I’d read such amazing things about it that it was going to be hard to live up to the hype. Also I am getting a bit fed up of contemporary art that has to be an experience. I’m quite happy to just look I don’t need to be doing! Having said that there were some works in this show I loved such as the light effect work shown here called “Your Uncertain Shadow (colour)” from 2010 which projected a colourful shadow of the people in the room. I liked the gentle sound of “Wavemachines” in the first room but it was hard to hear them over the chatter in the room. I did chicken out of the fog corridor but enjoyed “Beauty” with a thin mist of water in a dark room and was intrigued by the light effect outside the lifts on the floor of the exhibition Closes on 5 January 2020 Reviews Times Guardian Te...

Dull exhibition at Tate Modern looking at the life and work of the Korean artist Nam June Paik. In some ways this show was very innovative but I found the works needed such long explanations that I found I switched off and didn’t engage. It’s a while since I went and reading my notes back I find that very little of it has stayed with me. A lot of it represented performance art and I find that is difficult to demonstrate in a static exhibition. I did quite like “TV Room” a room full of plants and tv screens and the candle in a TV shown here. Closes 8 February 2020 Reviews Times Guardian Telegraph

Dramatic installation at Tate Modern by Kara Walker. This work consists of a giant fountain based on the idea of public sculptures and the Victoria Memorial outside Buckingham Palace. The narrative looks at the African diaspora, the slave trade and a critic of the British Empire and it has a long title in the form of an 18th century hand bill. It is made of reusable cork, wood and metal. There was a smaller shell shaped work on the other side of the bridge. However most of all the work filled the space well and was fun as well as thought provoking. Closes 5 April 2020 Reviews Times Guardian Telegraph Evening Standard

Wonderful five week course organised by the London Art History Society and held at the Art Workers’ Guild looking at how photography has developed over the last 150 years and how it has influenced and been influenced by fine art. The lecture, Tim Satterthwaite, was very clear and gave a narrative across the five afternoons while also admitting there were a lot more themes he could follow. Starting with the discovery of photography he took us through the main figurative and street photographers and discussed their influence on and how they were influenced by the figurative art of the time.   He had excellent slides and slide lists which took us from the earliest work of Louis Daguerre and Fox Talbot through the Atget and his wonderful photographs of Paris streets, to the rise of urban life as a subject by Paul Strand and Cartier-Bresson and finishing with   a look at contemporary art photography. I came away with a much better knowledge of and a real interest in...

Fascinating exhibition at the National Maritime Museum looking at the science and cultural significance of the Moon. I loved the mix of science and society in this show. It opened with a look at what the moon has meant to people over the years and how its cycle has influenced us even before we understood it. It then looked at the early science of discovery including a mention of James Nasmyth who had also been featured in the Enlightenment exhibition I’d been to earlier that week. I loved the section on the art of the moon including this lovely picture of it seen from the Thames at Greenwich, a view I have seen many times. It included the earliest drawings as well as contemporary art. There was also a good section explaining the science and for all of ten minutes I understood tides but I’m afraid I’m back to being puzzled. There was of course an excellent section on the Apollo space missions as the show was marking the 50th anniversary of the moon landing. This include...

Interesting temporary display at the Science Museum looking at Britain’s unmanned rocket, Skylark. I hadn’t know anything about this and was fascinated by this display. The rocket was designed for scientific experiments and began flying in 1957. It operated out of the Millard Space Science Laboratory and its work included taking ultraviolet images of the cosmos. I was surprised at how small it was and that each one only flew for 10 minutes and yet there were nearly 450 flights in all. I loved a video of people who worked on the project sharing their memories of it. My father worked at a scientific establishment in the 1950s and they reminded me of him and his friends and the stories they told. It also pointed out that, as it only stopped flying in 2005, many of the current astro-scientists started their careers using it as part of their phds. Closing date unknown. 

Fascinating exhibition at the Science Museum looking at the history of code makers and breakers and how they came together in the UK to form GCHQ. This show was based on the collection of GCHQ and told the story clearly and told some interesting stories but felt a bit dry in places. The organisation was formed after the First World War bringing together naval and army code breakers. The most interesting section was on Bletchley Park and the code breaking work in the Second World War. It not only looked at the technical work but also at life there. I also loved the recreation of a 1950s house to tell the story of the spy couple, Helen and Peter Kroger, which included some of their equipment like the camera in a talc tin shown here. There was a great display of secure phones including Margaret Thatcher’s briefcase and one of the Queen’s red phones. It pointed out that the Queen is GCHQ’s longest standing individual customer. It was also interesting to see the less heroic...

Intriguing exhibition at the Science Museum organised by the Royal Photographic Society of prize winning science photographs. The show had some lovely quotes around the walls on science and looking including from Proust “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new lands but in seeing with new eyes”. A lot of these pictures illustrated this by taking pictures from new angles or using photographic techniques to show something which couldn’t be seen with the naked eye. There were some astonishing images such as the attached by Norm Baker of a collection of gall stones and Kym Cox’ picture of a close up of a soap bubble. I also loved Viktor Sykora’s close up of a stage beetle. My only criticism was why the room was so cold when I went! It would have been nice to linger a bit longer over some of the images but you had to keep moving to keep warm. Closes 5 January 2020

Fascinating exhibition at the Science Museum looking at how artists and scientists explore new ideas. I’d been looking for an exhibition like this for a while with the art of the Enlightenment at the heart of it. The show told 20 stories over four themes to highlight interactions between scientists and artists and how they inspired each other both then and over the centuries since. From the first large picture by Joseph Wright of Derby I was hooked. The first section looked at sociable science and explained the ideas of the Enlightenment via the Wright of Derby picture. It also had a fascinating section on the invention of artificial dyes in the Victorian era and the reaction against them from artists and designers. All art types were covered so a section on the invention of artificial fibres used the film “The Man in the White Suit” as its artistic example. It also looked at how Polaroid partnered with Ansel Adams to promote its cameras. My favourite section, Troubled H...

Fascinating exhibition at the National Gallery looking at portraits painted by Gauguin. I loved the leaflet that went with this show as it was very honest about Gauguin's life and I got the impression that, like me, the author liked the art but loathed the man. The opening line in the introduction to room 1 was “Gauguin was undoubtedly self-obsessed”. OK this was the room of self-portraits but the comment set the tone. In my notes in the leaflet I had already written “Can I slap him” on picture number 4! All the way through I kept reading things which just made me loath him more. He was commissioned to paint a portrait of a Breton aristocrat’s daughter but he painted her with one of his own sculptures of a menstruating woman to represent her transition to womanhood. Needless to say the aristocrat refused to pay for it. Also the fact that in later life he called his studio in Polynesia “The House of Pleasure” and was by this time suffering from syphilis. There ...

Interesting exhibition at the Bernard Jacobson Gallery showing works on paper by Robyn Denny. Denny was part of the “New Generation” of British artists which included Peter Blake and David Hockney. He a mural for the Austin Reed shop in 1958 and this show included a maquette for this work shown here. I loved some work which used five layers of card with sections cut out and fanned to show all the colours. I also like the early collages. The main downstairs gallery showed small intimate works including a series called 1A. Closes 10 November 2019

Beautiful but strange exhibition at White Cube, Mason’s Yard of new work by Damien Hirst. These works were beautiful round mandalas made of butterfly wings on household gloss paint. These huge circles, in iridescent colours, were striking but had a sense of cruelty. They pull you into their centre which was usually a single whole butterfly. It drew on ideas of Victorian lepidopterist displays with elements of abstraction and also gave a sense of the fragile made concrete. The elephant in the room was where he gets the wings from. There was no mention of this in the handout or any notices in the show. In a way this added to the sense of cruelty but I would have liked this made plain. Closed on 2 November 2019 Reviews Times Guardian Telegraph

Stunning exhibition at the Art Workers’ Guild of work by Edward Stones. These paintings were wonderful still lives and interiors packed with art historic references such as the one shown incorporating a magazine with a centre spread of   Vermeer’s Girl with the Pearl Earring. In some the artist is seen Velazquez like in   a mirror and all of them featured warm inviting interiors. I so wanted one of these! Closes 15 November 2019

Fabulous exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery looking at the lives and art of the women of the Pre-Raphaelite movement. I was worried that this would just be a lot of portraits of hair and pouting lips but instead it looked at each of the women’s lives in their own right not just as a wife, lover or sister of one of the men. The pictures selected tended to represent a specific moment in their lives not just be a famous picture you know well. There was also lots of examples of their own work and their stories were told well in good commentaries. I loved the room bringing together the three great models, Lizzie Siddall, Fanny Cornford and Annie Miller. I found the show very moving and welled up at seeing a lock of Lizzie Siddall’s hair which was the deep auburn you hoped it was. This was closely followed by another teary moment finding out the Fanny Cornford died in a poor law infirmary and seeing her admission entry and photograph as an old lady. The main big room...

Lovely exhibition   at the National Theatre looking at the work of the costume department. The clothes were shown in a wonderful display like a low stage packed with some of your favourite National Theater characters from the last few years. It was fascinating to see the clothes close up and, unlike some theatrical costumes, the detail was stunning. I loved the fact that the exhibition looked at all aspects of the wardrobe department not just the designers.There was a interesting section on the dressers with a fun video of a quick change, and a look at the people who have to wash and maintain the clothes. They also looked at how clothes sometimes need to be distressed using an army jacket from Warhorse as an example. I think my favourite was a sheer, gold dress from the recent Anthony and Cleopatra with a green velvet coat decorated with gold scarabs.   Closes March 2020 Review Evening Standard

Delightful  display at Charleston Farmhouse showing the lovely portrait of Virginian Woolf by her sister Vanessa Bell on loan from the National Portrait Gallery. I’m very fond of this picture and it was lovely to see it in a new setting. The loan is part of a series by the National Portrait Gallery called Coming Home which sees 50 portraits of iconic individuals from the national collection travelling to the towns and cities most closely associated with their subjects. What a lovely idea and I’ll certainly look out for more of these. It was particularly nice that this was painted in 1912 as Asheham just a few miles from Charleston while Virginia was living there. It’s a tender, domestic picture yet in a modernist style with blocks of colour in the background and the wonderful orange chair outlining the figure. I think it shows the affection of one sister to another although I’m not sure I normally picture Virginia knitting in my mind. Closing 19 January 2020

Charming exhibition at Charleston Farmhouse looking at the story and work of the Omega Workshop. Founded in 1913 the Omega workshop was the brain child of Roger Fry, inspired by the spirit of Post-Impressionism, who set up a co-operative of artists to bring colour into Edwardian homes and to provide paid work for those designers. Although the workshop only lasted until 1919 it work has had a lasting effect. The show brought together a wonderful array of objects as well as pictures painted at the time or showing Omega items. There was also good use made of archive material. I liked the way it was arranged by type of object so you got a section on rugs as well as a display case of lamps. I think my favourite section looked at furniture as it gave you a real sense of what these rooms would have looked like, although of course you can also go round the house itself to see the effect. A star of the show was a newly acquired portrait of a woman with white Omega plates on the...

Nice event at Charleston Farmhouse to mark the opening of a new apple tree orchard for those of us who had given money towards it. This had been a long time coming as it was one of the Centenary projects however various very Charleston misfortunes had scuppered previous versions of it such as the cows in the nearby field eating the initial hedge that was put it! The new version is a an oak tree and line of Sussex apple trees along the edge of the carpark. As the gardener said it’s a long thin orchard. We had a nice ceremony at the trees where Virginia Nicholson, granddaughter of Vanessa Bell and President of the Charleston Trust, unveiled a plaque with the donor’s names on and gave a lovely speech on apples in Bloomsbury legend. A group of us who get tickets to all events in the literature festival had clubbed together to dedicate a tree to one of our number who died a few years ago, Patrick, so it was also lovely to see his oak tree with a nice dedication on it. I’m hoping...

Small pop-up exhibition at London Bridge station marking   National Album Day. Information boards highlight the influential, best-selling and iconic albums of Scotland, the North, the Midlands and London and the South. Each region shows the best sellers in that area then two guests from the music business suggesting the most influential and most iconic by artists from that area. Each featured album’s information includes artist, album title, date, a short write up and album cover. It was interesting to realise where artists come from plus to be reminded of old favourites. This was a nice diversion when travelling. Now closed.

Exuberant exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum celebrating Zandra Rhodes’s 50 years in the fashion business. The show has designs from every year of Rhodes’s career and was a fabulous display packed with colourful clothes. It came with an excellent booklet which told you a lot about each outfit but it was a bit difficult to read as you went round so it would have been nice to have a bit more explanation in the show itself. I loved the section on how she designed the patterned material she uses which had a hand drawn design, original silk screen reproduction of the pattern card, some printed chiffon and two dresses made from the design.   Also the section on her recent designs for opera and for the film Bohemian Rhapsody, recreating some of her designs from the 1970s. I think my favourite dress was a pink flapper style one from the 1980s which was heavily beaded to catch the light. It had a touch of the Princess Diana’s about it. Closes 26 January 2020 ...