Picture perfect
Packed water, Kendal mint cake, iPod and AK47 and went up to town for a ‘day out’. Pollution flavoured rain lashed the streets bringing a touch of New Orleans to the centre of town but did not dampen the spirits of the performers at the Balanese Festival in Trafalgar Square, just their dresses and henna tattoos, resulting in women in transparent dresses with full body runny mascara prancing to the sound of a damp drumbeat. Very foreign.
Luckily my pursuits for that day were of the indoor variety, a visit to the National gallery and the National Portrait Gallery.
The café in the first has the saucier waitresses, but the café in the latter has the better view.
As for the art, a few things worth note. The first is astonishment that anything so vibrant can survive over such a long period. Outstanding pictures were many but special mention has to be made of ‘whistlejacket’ by Stubbs. Truly astonishing picture of a racehorse, painted full-size and with an expression that seems to say ‘what are you doing putting that mustard on your finger like that?’.
Into the NPG and splurged on an audio tour. Excellent and great fun. Top moment had to be looking at portrait of Baden Powell while a recording of the great man himself played and he explained the meaning of ‘dib dib dib’ and ‘dob dob dob’. Interesting, to see a picture of a man and hear him speaking across the years.
Great double portrait of Kingers and Martin Amis, apparently painted after Kingers’ initial refusal. Considering that there are other portraits of him suspect this had more to do with him being a cantankerous old git than any real belief in nature of portraits or sitting for them.
Wandering the halls and looking at the portraits of the famous, the infamous and the worthy one was struck by the sense of how quickly, at the arse end of the 20th century, the nature of worth had changes. The faces in the portraits were literally those of people who had changed the world and then, at the end, you come to the modern bit and there’s a picture of some actor who, okay, may have been good in a cameo in a Harry Potter movie but hardly invented radium.
In short - Tudors = tights, Elizabethans = ruffs, Victorians = beards and 6:30 = my hitting La Perla for a few mohitos.
Luckily my pursuits for that day were of the indoor variety, a visit to the National gallery and the National Portrait Gallery.
The café in the first has the saucier waitresses, but the café in the latter has the better view.
As for the art, a few things worth note. The first is astonishment that anything so vibrant can survive over such a long period. Outstanding pictures were many but special mention has to be made of ‘whistlejacket’ by Stubbs. Truly astonishing picture of a racehorse, painted full-size and with an expression that seems to say ‘what are you doing putting that mustard on your finger like that?’.
Into the NPG and splurged on an audio tour. Excellent and great fun. Top moment had to be looking at portrait of Baden Powell while a recording of the great man himself played and he explained the meaning of ‘dib dib dib’ and ‘dob dob dob’. Interesting, to see a picture of a man and hear him speaking across the years.
Great double portrait of Kingers and Martin Amis, apparently painted after Kingers’ initial refusal. Considering that there are other portraits of him suspect this had more to do with him being a cantankerous old git than any real belief in nature of portraits or sitting for them.
Wandering the halls and looking at the portraits of the famous, the infamous and the worthy one was struck by the sense of how quickly, at the arse end of the 20th century, the nature of worth had changes. The faces in the portraits were literally those of people who had changed the world and then, at the end, you come to the modern bit and there’s a picture of some actor who, okay, may have been good in a cameo in a Harry Potter movie but hardly invented radium.
In short - Tudors = tights, Elizabethans = ruffs, Victorians = beards and 6:30 = my hitting La Perla for a few mohitos.
1 Comments:
Yes well, I thought I would just say, more than emailing or IMing my friends at work, I rather enjoy reading your blog because it is so descriptive and usually pretty hilarious---I wish I could write that way.
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