Cathy's Art Diary

Fascinating exhibition at Hampton Court Palace focusing on an altar cloth which may have been a dress worn by Elizabeth I. This was just a small show but was packed with information about the altar cloth and the convincing reasons why it may well have been reworked from a dress worn by Elizabeth I. The cloth belonged to a church in Becton and was probably donated in memory of Elizabeth’s lady in waiting, Blanche Parry.   The pattern cutting in the reworking of the piece indicated it would have been a dress. Most interesting was the evidence around the materials used such as real silver thread which would only have been used at court. I was amazed to see the books from which the embroidery patterns were taken including the design for the sweet frogs in the design in “Four legged animals” by Nicolaes de Bryn. The textile was shown with the Rainbow portrait of Elizabeth by Gheerarts the Younger in which she is wearing a remarkably similar undergown. When you looked at ...

Lovely new art gallery at Hampton Court Palace for displaying the Royal art collection. I visited this on a lovely day out to the Palace with friends. We went round a lot of the palace and gardens but I also wanted to see the new space as I’d seen reviews of it. I expected a long gallery like at Buckingham Palace but instead it’s an interesting series of rooms with some old friends in. It was great to see the Artemisia Gentileschi self-portrait which is one of my favourite pictures. Also a couple of Caravaggio’s. I liked the room of Canaletto’s particular as one showed a flat I stayed in a few years ago.   I will be interested to if the space is used for exhibitions or stays as a ‘greatest hits’ gallery. Also it will be interesting to see what is in the great gallery at Buckingham Palace this year as I recognized a number of the pictures from there last year. Reviews Guardian Evening Standard