Cathy's Art Diary

My first visit to the refurbished Young V&A previously the Museum of Childhood. Apologies that it’s taken me a while to get to see this refurbishment which has been open about a year and has since won the Art Fund Museum of the Year award. I had been before the changes and it was looking more spruce and cared for. A fun spiral staircase with a mirror feature has been added with the café nestled underneath it. There were much improved toilets and an additional lift. However the galleries were somewhat hidden and despite fun, big signage it was unclear what they offered from the main space, almost like it didn’t matter. It has given the curators a chance to rethink the displays and they are now aimed at children not just about them. It certainly seemed to be working when I was there in the summer holidays as it was buzzing with children enjoying the space. Reviews Times Guardian Telegraph Evening Standard    

Lovely exhibition at the Museum of Childhood of photographs of siblings by Madeleine Waller. As I don’t have any siblings I found this really interesting. It looked at how sibling relationships affect identity which is usually looked at through the prism of the relationship with parents. Each person is photographed alone but in the same setting as their siblings, usually within their home and is accompanied by a comment from the sitter about their role in the family. It was interesting to see how early on people define their roles and I wondered how these changed or are allowed to change. It would have been nice to see some adults included to get an idea of how relationships change and what they mean in later life. There were some lovely quotes, my favourite being from one girl with two brothers “I can always say you’re my favourite to get things off them.” Closes on 20 May 2018

Strange little exhibition at the Museum of Childhood of artist led work based on the museum’s collection. The star of the show was Christie Brown’s figurative ceramics “Ludus Est” which were tableaux of two dolls from the collection, imaging they come to life at night and explore the museum. They meet interact with other objects. I love the one of them teaching other toys. I was less convinced by the other project by photographer Madeleine Walker and Katherine Tulloh which encouraged local school children to re-enact their dreams and videoed them. It was an interesting idea but I wasn’t sure how good an idea it was to get children to relive these ideas. Dreams are dreams not reality. Closes on 9 January 2019  

Charming exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum of Childhood looking at the life and work of the children’s author, Michael Morpurgo. Any show in which you are greeted by the wonderful War Horse puppet from the National Theatre production has to be a winner. I loved the show and get quite sentimental every time I see Joey. I loved the fact that the three puppeteers are called the Head, the Heart and the Hind. This beautifully designed show started with a good biography of Morpurgo who came across as a lovely, loyal person. It looked at his time at Sandhurst and why he writes so many books about war. He wants children to understand war and be critical of it. It also looked at his City Farms project to give city children the chance to live and work on a real far. The exhibition was in themes of books with nice sections of original manuscripts and examples of the different illustrators and book covers. There were also some touching objects such as the picture of Jo...