Head down to Piccadilly today… And today, in this case, is about three weeks ago so that the full lockdown hasn’t yet come into force but it’s clearly on its way and the capital, so renown for its bustling streets and continuous crowded swirl of amorphous humanity, while not completely empty, is notable for the … Continued
Last week’s blog ended up with me having reached the special Surrealist displays of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and putting things on hold with a fade-out image of one of those iconic Dali lobster telephones (in fact, a rare albino one). So, what better vision of a dreamworld fantasy landscape to restart … Continued
Last week’s blog ended with me jumping on a train at Dundee and heading south where, about ninety minutes later, I got off at Edinburgh although, just to set the spacio-temporal scene straight, I suppose I should offer assurances that I’m haven’t been breaking any curfews or flouting government health advice restrictions but merely stretching … Continued
Most of yesterday…and before going any further, I suppose that I’d better explain that yesterday, in this particular case is, in fact, almost two weeks ago, when things were still fairly normal and definitely before the deadly carnivorous anagram really started to take hold, turn the world upside down and give it a nasty shake. … Continued
In the past few years he’s had a couple of very big, very well received shows at the Royal Academy and a super successful retrospective at Tate Britain. An active octogenarian who’s retained both the soft lilting accent of his Northern upbringing and the cheeky mischievous grin that one suspects was acquired soon after his … Continued
The wintery rains are spattering down as I exit Green Park tube station and by the time I turn off Piccadilly and get to the bottom of Dover Street, ascend the steps and clunk the brass door knocker outside the Spruth Magers gallery, I’m feeling a bit more drizzled upon than I prefer and my … Continued
What does it mean to be a male in today’s world? Well, um, er, of course, er, crikey…ahem, hang on a minute, it er, well um er… On consideration, I suppose the different responses to a question like that tend to separate the male population out along a spectrum of possibilities – and apologies if … Continued
Whither painting? It’s a question that’s been cropping up and bearing down on the kind of sad serious souls who have sufficient schedule space to consider such existential cultural conundrums, for a very long time. Certainly, at the start of the Modernist era it came to the fore when the first technological revolution gave rise … Continued
When it comes to the taxonomic classification and categorisation of art and artists from the Modernist age, while I may not be quite up to the neurotic specialist subject levels of the typical atypical Mastermind contestant, I still like to think I’ve got a pretty good understanding of who’s who and what’s what. So, I … Continued
Head down to Charing Cross tube station and exit onto the Strand, where I call into a Pret a Manger to munch through one of their soggy bacon and egg brioches before continuing on and turning into Somerset House, crossing the Palladian piazza to get to the South Wing entrance, whereupon I pick up a … Continued