Cathy's Art Diary

Unusual exhibition at Somerset House looking at the work of Sam McKnight a hair stylist working with photographers and creative teams for 40 years. He has worked on 190 Vogue covers. I must admit this was a whole new world to me! I’ve had the same hairstyle for well over 10 years and like something which takes no effort in the morning. This show talked a lot about how hair can set a mood and be a mark of change in life. It was quite image heavy but I loved the two main displays at either end showing off work he had done for the catwalk. I must admit probably more for the clothes than the hair but I did appreciate that this was all part of the look. At one end was a display of Vivienne Westwood clothes with big hair and at the other end Karl Lagerfeld for Channel with sleeker styles. Upstairs there were wigs in display case but on the whole the story was told with photographs. It was interesting to see the work he’d done with different women with quite a large section ...

Eclectic exhibition at Somerset House organised by the British Council, British Fashion Council and Mercedes Benz as part of London Fashion Week to showcase emerging international designers with over 80 designers from 26 countries. There was a loose theme of local\global. Most of the show was a series of countries that had taken rooms and featured a selection of their designers. Some stuck more closely than others to the local/global theme and some were arranged more like installations than a display to show off the clothes. Can I have a small whinge here at exhibitions which use flashing lights in their displays? I find this very distracting and I find it hard to look at the thing which is meant to be on show. On the whole most of the clothes weren’t that practical and I’m not sure I’ll be wearing them for the office. I did like the Indian display which had an interesting striped woollen suit on it and other designs on a pastoral theme. I fell for some handbags in the Egy...

Delightful exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery looking the design work of the Bloomsbury Group and the output of the Omega Workshops. Roger Fry founded the Omega Workshop in 1913 with the idea of giving artists creative freedom and injecting a sense of fun into interior design. I loved the quote from him “we have suffered for too long from the dull and stupidly serious”! Work produced by the workshop was not signed by individuals. The exhibition included lots of the Omega reference designs which would be used as models on any objects. There was a also a great collection of rug designs and it was wonderful to see an original carpet shown with them. The explanations also talked about how Fry worked with manufactures to get the designs translated into objects. Along the centre of the room was a display case with a selection of the ceramic designs many of them thrown and made by Fry. I loved a blue terrine with a tiger handle and a lovely large green vase. They had exampl...

Interesting exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery looking at drawings with inscriptions or writing on them. The commentary gives a good overview of why there might be writing from simply the artist’s signature possibly with a date, through colour notations, collector’s stamps, adding a narrative or writing unrelated to the picture and there were good examples of all these reasons. There was a nice sketch by Rubens for the Creation of the Animals of a swooping God and expressive lions with a gamp in the middle in which he’d written “creation of man” which was going to be a different sketch to work up the detail but he’d indicated where that motif would fit. I loved Juan de Juanes study of an altarpiece with two different versions for the patron to choose from and calculations of the cost and a recipe for gilding glue on the back. It gave a real sense of a working artist. Similarly there was a drawing by the school of Raphael with a list of food for the week on it! As it’s...

Small exhibition at the National Gallery looking in detail at a painting of the Magdalene by Cagnacci on loan from the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena. This artist is best known for painting seductive half-length female nudes often in the guise of a mythical figures and this picture has an element of that in that the central figure of the Magdalene was quite sensual. She is shown at the moment on repentance having thrown off her find clothes and dropped her jewellery box and lying on the floor being comforted by her sister Martha. A figure of virtue in the form of an angel chases off a figure of vice as a devil in the background. This moment isn’t mentioned in the bible but was being discussed by theologians in the 16th and 17th centuries. I loved the way her clothes were lying on the floor in a heap and the detail in which her jewellery was shown. Looking at it is a great way of studying the accessories of the time, saying which I want her lovely blue and gold shoes with ...

Beautiful exhibition at the National Gallery of work by four Australian artists painting in the Impressionist style Tom Roberts, Charles Condor, Arthur Streeton and John Russell. The show focused at first on the three artists who worked in Australia and made a point of how they were helping to define the national identity at a time which covered the centenary of Captain Cooks discover of the continent in 1888 and the formation of the country in 1901. I loved the section on their 1889 9 x 5 exhibition which features small works painted on the reverse of cigar box lids 9 in by 5 in in size in deep wooden frames with a gold inner frame. These were loose but concentrated pictures such as a lovely one of the bend in the road in the rain. I liked the contrast between the city and rural pictures. The city ones were darker but showed a pride in what had been built and established in a short time. I liked one by Streeton of the Railway Station at Redfern with a vast expanse of...

Lovely exhibition at Canada House of work by Andrew Salgado from the last ten years. These were wonderful large portraits and self-portraits in fantastic bold colours. They used words and motifs within the picture to express the character and mood of the person. The best example of that is one called “Afterlife/Osiris” where the man has an eye on the back of his hand, a cross and heart on his cheek and words in the border. I loved a smaller picture called “Wisher” of a man holding a rose. At first glance it’s a romantic picture then you notice that the small square of orange on the stem is a 99p price tag implying that the rose is artificial. My favourite was the large red one called “Fin de Siècle” with a figure in a black coat looming from a dark red background with a striking red hand. Closes on 28 February 2017