Cathy's Art Diary

Feisty discussion   at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival pairing contemporary artists Maggi Hambling and Sarah Lucas. At first this seemed an unlikely pairing but it turns out they are great friends, living close to each other in Suffolk. The discussion flowed freely ably chaired by art critic, Louisa Buck. They compared their studio practice and an exhibition in Hastings which had just been announced where they are to choose work by each other they admire. Hambling revealed that she has recently lost the little finger on her right hand so is increasingly working with her left hand in her daily practice of drawing. As ever her eye rolling said so much. Review Times Guardian    

Wonderful exhibition at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert of new work by Maggi Hambling. I love Hambling’s work so it was a delight to walk past the gallery and find this show. I hadn’t realised that she had a near fatal heart attack in New York in March 2022. She started this set of paintings immediately following her return to her home. I got a sense both of the joy of life following such an experience and her need to paint to understand what had happened.   I felt a a person who processes life via her art. I loved the mix of thick impasto paint and a thinner runny medium. The commentary described them as “an intense landscape of experience” and I certainly felt I reacted to some like a sublime landscape. I also thought one small one was a a self-portrait. Closed 24 November 2023

Fabulous interview at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival with the artist Maggi Hambling. I heard   Hambling at Charleston a couple of years ago and just loved her and this interview did not disappoint. She is wonderfully irascible and yet very endearing which seems a strange mix. Even while being introduced she was raising a rye but visible eyebrow at some of the praise for her and you immediately know she is going to be trouble, fun but trouble. The talk focused on the role drawing has played throughout her career in the light of a recent exhibition at the British Museum and its catalogue. She talked a lot about her early training at the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing under Cedric Morris and Lett Haines and at other art schools. I loved her stories about being the first artist in residence at the National Gallery including opening her studio for one afternoon a week. The brave interviewer, Simon Martin from Pallant House, used pi...

Fascinating exhibition at the British Museum of prints and drawings by Maggi Hambling. Hambling has made drawings and prints throughout her career and the title comes from   a quote from her about drawing “The challenge is to touch the subject with all the desire of a lover". My favourite pictures were the portraits which gave a real sense of the people not just a likeness. There was a very touching picture of a dying Cedric Morris which she drew from memory after visiting him in hospital. I loved a big picture of John Berger. There was a great section which explained how a set of sea pictures developed from portraits of Henrietta Moraes. The pictures had a wonderful sense of space and have a feeling of looseness and yet close up they have a detailed construction and drawing technique. Closes on 29 January 2017 Reviews Guardian Evening Standard

Fabulous interview at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival with Maggi Hambling, the contemporary artist. I fell in love with her! She walked onto the stage as a great solid presence and glowered at the audience. The interviewer, Nicolette Jones, did a valiant job but didn’t stand a chance! However I did feel that under Hambling’s gruff, abrupt exterior there was a very pleasant, open and warm person with a wry sense of humour. As evidence of this she immediately shook hand with the chair at the end knowing she had used her for comic potential. Quite early on I gave up taking notes but just scrawled the odd quote. On a picture that had gone wrong “Stanley knife time”. On the pictures she had painted of George Melly after he died leaving her studio for an exhibition “Face it Maggi, George is dead”.   On painting “I try to get the paint on the move” and “I am a manual worker”.

Interesting exhibition at the King’s College Inigo Rooms at Somerset House of work by Maggi Hambling. I loved an installation called “War Requiem 2” which was a room playing Britten’s War Requiem with pictures of faces in spiralling paint   with two mirrors so you are included and a paint splattered chair. It had the effect of an explosion and victims on a battlefield. Another room had the top of a well from the Suffolk coast with sounds coming out of it which was very atmospheric. The final room contained her latest sculptures made in late summer 2013 as a follow up or “Aftermath” to her War Requiem pieces. These were found pieces of wood, remodelled, coated in plaster and then cast in bronze and painted. I liked the effect of these on mass in a large room. All in all an innovative use of this space which can sometimes be quite awkward as it is made up of a corridor and small rooms.

Atmospheric exhibition at the National Gallery of new works by Maggi Hambling. The pictures almost created an installation of large works of waves or waterfalls against grey walls. They had a feeling of the Monet’s at the Orangery and spoke to the new Monet display over the stairs from it. The room actually smelt of paint but I wasn’t sure if that was of the thickness of the paint on the pictures to because it had only recently opened. The pictures were thick splashes and swoops of paint. Often at the back there was a thin layer of paint with an almost lace effect. Some were quite monotone but others were packed with colour when you got up close. They reminded me of one of my favourite places in the world, North Point in Barbados where the waves crash against rocks. Reviews Guardian Telegraph Evening Standard