Summer Exhibition 2019


Underwhelming exhibition at the Royal Academy, their annual open-submission show hanging work by Royal Academician with art by amateurs.

I say underwhelming as I suspect I’ve been to too many of these and they are starting to look a bit samey. There was the usual electric variety of work but somehow this year it didn’t have the wow factor. When I come back to look at my notes in the catalogue I’m surprised at how few of the works I remembered despite saying I liked them.

I did like the hang of the large room 3 which included a large Anselm Keifer and a wonderful study in perspective by Ben Johnson “The Space Between Revisited”. The pictures had room to breathe and speak to each other. The architecture room left me with the usual questions about which buildings had been built and which were just fantasies. I loved a model for a new school in Erith which is just down the road from me so maybe I could go and look.

Works that stood out include the Tunnock Teacakes tiger, a barcode in russet colours called “A Glimpse of Autumn” by Anastasia Lewis, nine postcard sized sketches of the London Underground by Louise Soloway Chan and “Islington Back Garden with Self” by Melissa Scott-Miller.

My favourite picture was a lovely rather geometric picture of a harbour entrance by Vanessa Gardiner but it was hung too high to get a decent photograph. I also loved this small sculpture made from a book but I now can't find it in the catalogue to identify it! 

Closed 15 August 2019

Reviews
Times
Guardian
Telegraph
Evening Standard


Comments

Anonymous said…
Thank you! I value it.
10 September, 2019
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Thomas Becket: Murder and Making of a Saint

Image
Stunning exhibition at the British Museum on the life and afterlife of Thomas Becket. I studied Becket both at A Level and at university so I was really looking forward to this show and it did not disappoint. From walking in to see an old friend, the early Limoges casket showing the murder from the Victoria and Albert Museum, I was gripped. The show told the story well using fantastic objects and led you through his life, the murder, the political aftermath, his sainthood and miracles, and how Canterbury became a major pilgrimage site. It is hard to pick out the best objects as so many were wonderful. I loved that they had early copies of some of the five eyewitness accounts of the murder which made you fell you were almost touching the event. I liked the manuscript on his time in exile which was almost like a comic strip. How wonderful to get a 13th century font from Sweden which shows how far and how quickly the news that Henry II had integrated the murder spread. I think my...
Read more

Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year Exhibition 2019

Image
Delightful exhibition at Clarendon Fine Art showing pictures from the Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year TV series. I had loved the series which had set nine artists, both professional and amateur, to paint one of three celebrities. It then had a semi-final and final with them all looking at one sitter and in the final they also took on a commission. I loved the way you watched a picture build and how some were then made or spoiled by one stroke of paint.   Finding these pictures I knew so well in the flesh was therefore fascinating. None of them disappointed. My favourite artist from the final, Tom Mead, works looked just as good in real life if not better as you could see the detail. The show included his impressive self-portrait which he submitted to enter the competition, a wonderful fragmented picture of his reflection in a mirror giving a sense of movement. I loved that it included a large version of him and a miniature. His commission for the final of Jazzie B...
Read more

The Renaissance Nude

Image
Beautiful exhibition at the Royal Academy looking at the nude in Renaissance art. The show was gently themed but mainly let the pictures speak for themselves. It began by looking at the subjects, both religious and secular, which include nude figures then examined techniques and models used in these works, finishing by looking at more personal pictures. This is a period I’ve studied a lot so there were a lot of old friends and it was quite fun predicting what might appear. There were a few surprises too such as the rather surprising drawing of the Ecstatic Christ. I liked the fact the show included lots of different art forms not just paintings including sculpture, etchings, drawings and illuminated manuscripts. There were some fascinating hangs to draw comparisons particularly two sets of pictures by Giovanni Bellini and Hand Memling from almost exactly the same date. These were shown back to back in a display cabinet down the middle of one room. My favourite work was ...
Read more