Cathy's Art Diary

Quirky installation outside the Hayward Gallery of an inflated silver samovar. Art collective, Slavs and Tatars, presents this piece reflecting the multicultural and colonial histories of tea. It questions the role of tea in British history, tradition and popular culture. It’s an interesting statement but more excitingly it’s a giant inflated samovar in the public space, what’s not to love? It looks great against the concrete building and was a real discovery on a dull day. Closes 14 November 2021  

Fun event at Charleston Farmhouse inviting four queer artists to respond to the collection of over 400 erotic drawings by Duncan Grant which have recently been discovered. The event started with Darren Clarke, Head of Collections at Charleston, telling us about how the drawings came into the collection and giving an overview of what they include. Artists and activists, Neil Bartlett, Tanaka Mhishi and Kuchenga then responded to the work in in the form of though provoking essays. I particularly liked Bartlett’s piece which talked about how homosexuality was illegal when the drawings were done and how liberating yet secret that made them. These talks were broken up by short comic, life drawing sessions by Harry Clayton-Wright, for which we had each been given paper and acrylics to join in. I attach one of my efforts here. I’m not sure some of the other poses would pass the Google Blogger censor. I really enjoyed the exercise and want to do more. This session was part of a Queer ...

Eclectic exhibition at Watts Gallery celebrating the art of birds and featuring work for sale by 17 contemporary artists. My favourite work was Robert Greenhalf’s paintings based on sketches made in nature but completed in the studio but I also liked Richard Allen’s lovely woodcuts particularly one of geese pecking at grass. The show also included sculpture and I liked Susan O’Byrne’s small colourful birds. Closed 12 September 2021  

Charming exhibition at Watts Gallery on the life and work of the Edwardian artist Henry Scott Tuke. Tuke is best known for his wonderful pictures of youths by the sea in Cornwall which helped to revive the male nude in British art. We now see these as homoerotic images but there reception at the time was more nuanced also reflecting ideas of health, fitness and masculinity and the show discussed all aspects of the work. I liked the description that they “offered a pictorial space into which the possibility of male same sex desire might be explored”. I loved the detail that is known about the sitters both from Tuke’s own diaries and their own oral history collected by Brian Price. The images are made more poignant as they show the First World War generation before they were altered by that experience. It was fascinating to see some of Tuke’s early work including a striking triple portrait of three women singing “The Misses Santley” and a small bronze by him “The Watcher”. It wa...

Interesting exhibition at the Towner Gallery where the artist Mariana Castillo Deball picks a selection of works from the gallery’s own collection. Deball has picked works which look at interventions in the landscape both real and imagined. The works ranged from mysterious hill figures to depictions of the land as an agricultural environment that has been engineered and shaped over centuries. Of course being the Towner there was some Ravillious in the show but also other lovely images of the Sussex countryside. I love these artist curated selections from gallery collections as you get to see some unfamiliar work and to see a dialogue set up between pictures. Closes 16 January 2021  

Moving video installation at the Towner Gallery looking at man’s relationship with the sea, and its role in the history of slavery, migration, trade, and conflict. Over three large screens Akomfrah used a mix of footage from the BBC Natural History Unit, archive film and newly filmed material to contrast the beauty of the marine world and the destruction of animal and human life at sea and on the coastline. There were challenging recreated images of the slave trade but their power was lessened by the knowledge that the scenes were staged. More visceral was archive footage of polar bears being killed which were stark and real. The film was long at 48 minutes but mesmerising and well worth spending the time to watch it. Closed 26 September 2021

Delightful and insightful exhibition at the Towner Gallery looking at the life and work of John Nash. This was a well presented show with excellent commentaries which really told the story in an engaging way. Starting with a section on his First World War experiences it then went back to look at how he became and artist and his early works. It looked at the places where he lived and their effect on his art as well as his work as a war artist in the Second World War. I loved the variety of work in the show not just wonderful paintings but also prints, book illustrations, botanic drawings and even a Shell poster design. Throughout there was a great sense of friendship and of the artistic connections in British art in the early 20th century. Closed 26 September 2021    

Interesting online lecture from the National Gallery analysing two paintings in the collection which illustrate episodes in Homer’s Odyssey. Katy Tabard started by looking a Turner’s “Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus” from 1829 showing how it looks at the specific moment when Ulysses problems getting home following the war started. It shows the moment where, having tricked the cyclops, Polyphemus, by saying his name was Nobody, Ulysses cannot resist telling him who he really is so bringing down the wrath of Polyphemus’s father Poseidon. She talked about sketches Turner had made in Rome which fed into the work and possible inspirations. She then turned to the end of the story in Pinturicchio’s “Penelope with the Suitors” from the 1520s looking at how it combines various elements of the story in one image including elements from the journey in a sea scene through a window behind Penelope who is weaving. She also talked about how this was commissioned for a wedding and how Penelope’s fide...

Interesting online course from the London Art History Society summer school on how Western art has represented the major stories of the New Testament. Unfortunately in the end I could only do two of the six days which covered the period from the circumcision of Christ to the Last Supper. This meant I missed the introductory talk which might have given a bit more shape to the talks. I felt a certain amount of knowledge, which I did have, was assumed and it turned out a couple of the events in this part of the narrative had been covered in that introduction as an example of how the course would run. The summer school had been advertised as six linked but stand-alone sessions. I liked the form of the days lead by Clare Ford-Wille going through the narrative in sections, outlining which gospels the story appeared in and how it varied between them. This has taught me to look at a picture and think about which gospel it might be following as well as thinking about which aspect of a story...

Interesting day at the National Maritime Museum marking International Slavery Remembrance Day. Starting with a welcome ceremony with songs from Ethnovox and addresses from the director of the museum Paddy Rogers and the acting High Commissioner of Dominica there was lots to see and do. Movingly this also included a minutes silence for the victims of the recent earthquake in Haiti as the date of the day is that of the start of the Haitian Revolution. I chose to go to the talks on offer so heard Stella Dazie talk about her book on female slave activism talking to Karen McLean an artist and scholar. They talked about quiet female resistance partly coming from their knowledge of plants and herbs as well as character who resisted in a more obvious way. I then heard historian S.I. Martin discuss the Haitian revolution and how it’s ideas spread. It was a knowledgeable audience but I could have done with a bit more on the history of the uprising. With both talks, given the speakers were...

Colourful and thoughtful installation at the Now Gallery by illustrator Manjit Thapp, the galleries Young Artist Commission for 2021. A maze like structure contained an assortment of pictures, tapestries, carpets and mixed media pieces on the theme of holding back the jungle in your head which was well and simply expressed. I like the way you wander between small room finding new images and objects as you went. Closes 31 October 2021  

Interesting exhibition at the Design Museum on Margaret Calvert who designed fonts for the motorways and railways. So much of this show was so familiar and yet I had never thought before how the standard look and signage for roads and transport systems came about. Her first major project was signs for the M1 which were then used on other motorways and roads and became standard. She realised they had to be read at speed from a distance and that therefore people were recognising the shape of the word rather than the letters. Alongside the signposting she also design the standard road signs such as “Men at Work” and “Children Crossing”. Iconic images in the world. The show explained fonts very well and I confess I had never understood the difference between sans-serif, slab-serif and serif before. In the 1960s, when the railways were remodelled, she worked on a font for them this time devised to be read by slow moving pedestrians, which was used until privatisation. However she has...

Fascinating small exhibition at the Design Museum on the art robot Ai-Da. Named after Ada Lovelace, the computer pioneer, Ai-Da can sketch faces and talk to her models. I have read quite a bit about this phenomena but sadly Ai-Da wasn’t in the show. It did however explain how cameras in her eyes use facial recognition to scan faces then enable a robotic arm to draw in a fragmentary style. It then went explained how she reaction with people based on AI learned language and gestures. There was another section on how worked with her to design a font based on her discussions with a designer and her copying of the Arial font. I’ve not sure I fully understand but it seemed very clever. Closes 29 August 2021

Wonderful exhibition at the Design Museum on the life and work of 20th century designer Charlotte Perriand. Perriand began by working for Le Corbusier but the work she did for him went uncredited. For him she developed the classic steel framed chairs and in one section of the show there were modern reproductions you could sit in. They were so comfortable. I loved the room recreations including her 1927 flat which included an extendable table with a rubber top which rolled out of the wall. I just loved her economy of space. Later on their were modular book cases which you can still see in shops today. In the 1930s she moved into more organic forms and I fell in love with her Boomerang desk. It looked so ergonomic and practical. She spent time in Japan in the Second World War and designed the carpet shown here based on sailors graffiti on the ship she travelled over on. She went on to design travel agencies for Air France and a fabulous ski resort Les Arc which houses 30,000...

Fun sculpture outside the Design Museum by Zac Morris. Made entirely from discarded car parts including several vintage Morris Minor bonnets the work is a giant futuristic totemic mask. It looks impressive in the space and quite different from different angles. Evidently it also references the assumed British tradition of Morris Dancing, which actually came to the UK courtesy of the Moors although I would not have got that from looking at it. This was part of Kensington and Chelsea 2021 Public Art Trail but unfortunately I didn’t have time to do any more of it.

Puzzling exhibition at Somerset House of work by four contemporary artists who have been in residence in the Somerset House Studios on the theme of the body as an archive. I must admit I found the handout impenetrable and really didn’t understand what the art works were trying to do other than it was about bodies containing the past and present. I didn’t have the patience to watch the video by Josiane M.H. Pozi in such a cramped space. Majed Aslam presented pharma-chemically modified photographs, not I’m not too sure either! The picture is of Col Self work on the idea of the mid-phases in sculptural work which I think I understand but don’t hold me to it. C losed 31 August 3021  

Surprisingly fascinating exhibition at Somerset House looking at the culture of skateboarding. I went to this show on the grounds I’ll go to anything that is free but expected to get little from it, not being a skateboarder, or knowing anyone who is, but it was really interesting from a sociological point of view. The show looked at how skateboarding had changed the urban environment with the building of skateparks and occupation of urban space by boarders. Evidently the skating space in the lower areas of the South Bank is now listed and was described in the blurb as “a sacred space”. It is the longest continually skated space in the world. I loved the way skating had developed as a subculture albeit one which has passed me by, but I did feel the hand of corporate bodies entering the space such as a Louis Vuitton skate shoe. I wonder what effect Sky Brown's Bronze medal in Tokyo will have on this?  Closes 19 September 2021

Innovative public art display in Piccadilly devised by the Royal Academy bringing together banners and decorated road crossings. The road crossings were in bright abstract designs by Vanessa Jackson RA called UpTownDancing. What a clever was of brightening up the urban space. The banners were by Michael Armitage, Farshid Moussavi RA and Yinka Shonibare RA and had the effect of there being Christmas decorations in the summer. There was also a film but I must admit I never spotted that. What a fun way of bringing art and colour into public spaces.   Closes 6 September 2021

Fun sculpture trail around the West End of London featuring lions decorated by various contemporary artists and personalities. Organised by Tusk, the African wildlife charity the 27 lions aim to raise awareness of issues facing lions such as the fact that their population has declined by almost 50% in the last 25 years. The figures are sponsored by supporting organisations and businesses and decorated by a an artist or personality. If you are lucky enough to be in or around the Hamptons there is another pride there as well as individual lions around the globe. I managed to see 19 of them. I was interested to spot one by Adam Dant, an artist whose work I’d only seen a few days before , His lion was called “Lion Pride” and was in Covent Garden. I include a picture of that one plus “Manebow” by Patrick Hughes which looked great in the Burlington Arcade and Nick Gentry’s “Wild Roots” by St Martin in the Fields. 

Colourful exhibition at the Royal Academy of work by Michael Armitage. I had seen some of Armitage’s work in the Venice Biennale and liked it so was interested to see more. They were large bold pieces painted on Lubugo bark cloth, a rough prestigious cloth used for ceremonial purposes. I loved the way Armitage incorporates the seams and holes in the fabric into the pictures giving a great texture. I think my favourite was the majestic “Pathos and the Twilight of the Idle” showing a bikini-clad male protestor during the 2017 Kenyan elections. He rises about the crowd with echoes of Titian’s “The Assumption of the Virgin” which makes this a very grand image with religious overtones. There was also another side gallery with works by other East African artists which put Armitage’s work in context. However I have to say that I think £13 was very expensive for this show. There were about 15 works by Armitage then the related work. It felt very sparse. A similar show at a private gal...

Strange exhibition at Lisson Gallery featuring the work of five contemporary artists on the theme of the mysterious workings of the mind. I must admit I’m not sure I would have understood the theme just from looking at the work. The press release says they draw on experiences of dreaming, trance, hallucination and related mental states. However there were some interesting works. I loved the tapestry shown here by Laure Prouvost called “This Means Tableau” which had an amazing 3D effect goat in the centre. It was very striking. I also liked Susan Hillier’s “Homage to Gertrude Stein: Lucidity and Intuition”, an Art Deco writing desk with the underneath stuffed with modified books on automatism. These were shown with large, bright silk hangings by Emma Talbot and an odd video by Nathalie Djurberg & Hans Berg which I’m afraid I didn’t have the patience to watch on a busy day. Closed 28 August 2021 Review Guardian  

Interesting exhibition at Flowers Gallery of work by six self-taught international artists. All the artists explore the idea of surrounding yourselves with others, real and imaginary, often for companionship. All of them create a group of characters who repeat in their work over the years. I liked Keisuke Ishino’s small flat figures. Reading the nice booklet for the show it says he creates over 300 figures a year. They are made from 2 dimensional drawings in marker pens which he converts to 3d art works. I was also intrigued by Susan Te Kahurangi King’s drawings from the 1960s on show here particularly as they were done on old copied of The Business Who’s Who of Australia. The picture shown here is by Misleidys Francisca Castillo Pedroso made from construction paper and fringed with evenly spaced brown tape used by the artist to stick them to her walls at home. All presented interesting, very personal ideas. Closes 28 August 2021  

Beautiful exhibition at White Cube Mason’s Yard of new work by Rachel Kneebone. I have seen Kneebone’s work before most notably a column in the Renaissance sculpture gallery at the V&A. Her work consists of white porcelain apparent fragments collected together into large sculptures. In this show some of these hung from the ceiling and gently swayed in the air. For this collection she had taken inspiration from Géricult’s “The Raft of the Medusa” invoking contemporary themes of migration, displaced persons and hope in the face of despair. I love the way you start to see something within a piece that then seems to dissolve as you look at it more. A new addition to these works was the inclusion of a single smooth orb in each work. It was lovely to see them presented with some of her drawings and to read that the wonderful dark blue colour of the gallery was chosen by her to give the idea of sinking into or emerging from the seabed. Closes 4 November 2021

Thought provoking spontaneous public memorial on the South Bank opposite the Houses of Parliament to those who have died of Covid started by the Covid-19 Bereaved Families For Justice UK. T his memorial has been there for a long time but this was the first time I had been in that area of London to go and take a look. You are struck by the charming home made feel to it but more so to the sheer length of it. I’d assumed from pictures that it was just a couple of sections of the riverside wall but it goes on for 200m or more and hopes to have a heart of ever fatality. It was interesting to hear people talking about it. I heard one lady say that all the pink hearts were bright red when they were first added. I hope something will be done to preserve this and make it the official memorial before they fade completely. This is an important public initiated statement in a significant place, close to St Thomas’s and opposite Parliament.

Lovely small display at the Garden Museum on plantswoman Beth Chatto. In a project funded by Archives Revealed, The National Archives, The Pilgrim Trust and The Wolfson Foundation, Jane Harrison has catalogued the archive of Beth Chatto deposited at the Garden Museum and showed some of her discoveries in this small exhibition. The selection of books, photographs and documents showed how she turned wasteland in Essex into an environmentally sustainable garden and nursery and how she created a dry garden watered only by rain.    

Interesting exhibition at the Garden Museum of photographs of wild flowers by Hugo Rittson-Thomas. These pictures were from his “ Wildflowers For The Queen” inspired by the achievements of the Coronation Meadows established by HRH The Prince of Wales in 2013. It consisted of beautiful photographs of the flowers some taken from a variety of angles inspired by the approach he took to a portrait of the Queen which was also shown here where he pictures her from different angles in one shot. That in itself was inspired by the Van Dyck portrait of Charles I from three sides. Other works included compositions where the flowers were placed on a lightbox and the image taken to resemble botanical plates and pictures of flowers arranged by the floral design studio Yinari. Closes 17 October 2021

Elegant exhibition at the Garden Museum looking at the life and work of Constance Spry, the floral designer. This show was very cleverly designed to tell and show a lot in a small space even if, at times, it felt a bit cramped in these Covid times. Good use was made of show style display cases and innovative ways of showing objects. I was pleased I had done a talk by the curator before I went as sometimes the storytelling was a bit confusing due to the information board placing, The show covered the whole of her life from helping to set up mother and baby clinics in Ireland before the First World War, through running a day school until finally being discovered as a flower arranger in the late 1920s. She went on to become a fashionable designer doing a number of royal and society weddings and even doing the floral designs for the Coronation. She was also a great business woman, having products designed and produced by manufacturers such as the Fulham Pottery and endorsing other i...

Moving exhibition at the Imperial War Museum of new portrait photographs of Holocaust survivors. Organised with the Royal Photographic Society this show simply showed the photographs with a short biography of the sitter. Many of the survivors were shown with their family and the labels often listed how many children and grandchildren they had which seemed to emphasis their survival but also to point to family they had lost. The stories were all so monumental, to look at a dignified old lady and to read “By the aged of nine she was a slave labourer”. It was touching to realise how many of them had been very small children often brought out of Nazi occupied countries via the Kindertransport anyone who had experienced the camps are now very old.   It won’t be long before there are no direct survivors left. The pictures were arranged by photographer and a lot of the press coverage has centred around the fact that the Duchess of Cambridge has two pictures in the show which are Ve...