• Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Uganda 2013

Musiewild's blog

~ An occasional blog, mainly photos

Musiewild's blog

Monthly Archives: January 2017

An orgy of exhibitions, concluded

22 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by Musiewild in History, Photography, Travel, Uncategorized, Wildlife

≈ 15 Comments

Tags

Ardizzone, Bacchus, Camley Park, Cézanne, coot, Courtauld Gallery, Daumier, Granary Square, House of Illustration, Imperial War Museum, Kings Cross Development, Oradour-sur-Glane, Pissarro, Rodin, Somerset House, St Mary le Strand, St Pancras Station, World War 2

Ardizzone and Rodin.  Neither of us had before heard of the English illustrator, Edward Ardizzone (1900-1979).  But when I had read of the exhibition at the House of Illustration devoted to his work, I realised that I, like probably everyone else of my age who had read storybooks as a child, must have seen so many of his pictures.  And how familiar his style turned out to be!  And how delightful!  However, Ardizzone was also an official war artist in WW2, and in due course worked for the magazine ‘Punch’ .

But I’m getting ahead. The House of Illustration is on Granary Square, part of the Kings Cross development  project, and has been open there for a couple of years.  Mary and I stopped for coffee first at the café of a well-known supermarket housed in a very attractively converted old industrial building.

“A cappuccino and a flat white please.”

“We don’t do a flat white. Would you like a coffee?”

Well, that was a first!

40-p1250557001

Photography was not allowed, and they had run out of postcards.  I have picked these images up from internet sources (and will of course remove any subjected to protest that they are copyrighted.)

Illustrations for children.

41-th2znwp1z900142-th9001

Illustrations for adults

43-thboiu280700144-thv1l61ylc001

Many of his enticing book covers, for both adults and children, were exhibited.

45-thf2y4kbd8001

War pictures

46-thrl54ad7c00147-th6001

But this next really got to me.  (It is owned by the Imperial War Museum and is definitely in the public domain.)  It is called ‘A Drunken Dutchman in a Street in Bremen’.  So much more poignant than any photo.  And it reminded me of my visit to Oradour-sur-Glane a few years ago, that town sacked by the Nazis in 1944 as they retreated from western France, killing almost every single inhabitant, man, woman and child, many of them after they had been been herded into the church which was then set on fire.  The town was left as it was in 1945 as a memorial and is now a tourist ‘attraction’.

48-ardizzone_records_the_scene_in_his_diary_on_26_april_1945-_to_bremen_again_with_brian_de_grineau-_the_city_is_a_dead_one_-_ruins1001

Outside once more, we walked around the Kings Cross development, not yet finished.  To my delight I found that it abutted, over the Grand Union Canal, the Camley Park nature reserve, which I have yet to visit.

49-p1250559001

St Pancras Station in silhouette

50-p125056400151-p125056900152-p1250579001

53-p1250591001

This coot was almost literally under our feet, on the ‘wrong’ side of the canal.

A short bus ride took us round to the sunny side of St Pancras Station, where we changed routes.

54-p1250598001

We were heading for the Courtauld gallery, housed in Somerset House, which has a very varied history.

55-00156-p1250600001

Our view at lunch, taken in their café, would have been more interesting a few days either earlier or later.  Today they were clearing away the ice skating rink which had been there from mid-November to the middle of this month.

57_modifie-1

St Mary le Strand peeping over to the right

 

Making our way back to the Courtauld Gallery entrance, we heeded Bacchus’s warning.

58-p1250607001

Photography in the Rodin and Dance exhibition was not allowed, so here are scans of a couple of the more publishable exhibits.  Most of the others were studies (for sculptures) much too explicit for a nice girl like me to share. Rodin himself shared them with only a few friends.

59-rodin-woman-with-veil00160-rodin-mouvement-e001

 

The exhibition was small and quickly viewed, so we completed our visit to the Gallery by looking at some of the many other wonderful, well-known, exhibits. These are my photos.

61-cezanne-the-lake-at-annecy001

Cézanne, The Lake at Annecy

62-cezanne-the-card-players001

Cézanne, The Card Players, one of Mary’s favourites

64-001

Pissarro, Lordship Lane, Dulwich

65-rubens-landscape-by-moonlight001

Rubens, Landscape by Moonlight

 

I had only visited the Courtauld Gallery once before, decades ago when I lived in London.  I had fallen for and bought a postcard of this picture of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza by Daumier. I still have it, very dog-eared from years of use as a bookmark.  So I treated myself to a new one:

63-daumier-don-quichote-and-sancho-panza001

Many, many thanks to Mary for her company and hospitality over this couple of days.

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • Email

Like this:

Like Loading...

An orgy of exhibitions 1

20 Friday Jan 2017

Posted by Musiewild in Photography, Travel, Uncategorized

≈ 20 Comments

Tags

Becket Casket, Clare Chasuble, Hyde Park Corner, Ismaili Centre, Jesse Cope, Joseph Nash, Knightsbridge, Lockwood Kipling, Mayo School of Art, No 14 bus, Opus Anglicanum, Piccadilly, Piccadilly Circus, Prosper Lafaye, PSPO, rhododendron, Rudolf Swoboda, Rudyard Kipling, Shaftesbury Avenue, Steeple Aston Cope, Suzuki Masaya, Syon Cope, Transport for London, V and A, Victoria and Albert Museum

Mediaeval embroidery and John Lockwood Kipling. Earlier this week I spent a couple of days in London, staying with my friend Mary, to catch three exhibitions before they closed, this Sunday.  But the first astonishing exhibit was in Mary’s garden:  a rhododendron bush in full bloom!

01-p1250479001My father’s favourite bus route when my parents lived in London was the number 14, because it passed so many places of interest. Over all the years since, it has remained the same, as far as I know.  Certainly the small part we did, on the way to the Victoria and Albert Museum, gave me plenty of photo opps from the upstairs front seat, through the tinted window.

02-p1250480001

Shaftesbury Avenue

03-001

Piccadilly Circus

04-p1250482001

Piccadilly

05-p1250484001

Hyde Park Corner

06-p1250486001

Knightsbridge.  Better hoarding or the naked building works?

 

As for this, seen several times along Knightsbridge, we wondered if it was OK to drive anti-socially elsewhere.07-p1250488001We considered this building  virtually opposite the V and A, not particularly beautiful in the context of South Kensington, though when I went over later to see what it was – the Ismaili Centre – I could see that close up it had merit in many smaller architectural details.

08-001The desire for coffee obliged us to walk across the central square of the museum.09-p1250492001

Our principal target of the day was the exhibition, ‘Opus Anglicanum’, a style of English mediaeval embroidery which spread far into continental Europe.  We were astounded by the intricacy of the work, and although we were able to discover who these embroiderers were, we could gain no insight as to just how long it took to create these masterpieces, especially as those commissioned e.g. for visits of foreign rulers, and for funerals will have had tight deadlines.  The stitching was tiny in the extreme, and will have needed excellent light to execute. It was interesting to catch snatches of conversations of other visitors, some of whom clearly  had specialist knowledge.

Photos were not allowed, so the following are scanned from postcards. Sadly it is not possible to see the individual stitching in them.

10-the-clare-chasuble001

The Clare Chasuble

11-the-syon-cope001

The Syon Cope

12-detail-from-the-jesse-cope001

Detail from The Jesse Cope

13-the-steeple-aston-cope001

Detail from The Steeple Aston Cope

 

Exhibits were not only of embroidery:

14-the-becket-casket001

The Becket Casket

 

Having spent a good long time at this wonderful exhibition, we crossed the central square once more,

15-p1250498001and over lunch decided to visit another special exhibition in the Museum, (not in our original plan), that of work by, or inspired by, John Lockwood Kipling, father of Rudyard (whom his parents named after the village in Staffordshire where they had met.) Lockwood was a designer, illustrator (including of his son’s books) teacher, journalist and curator.  Among other things he was an architectural sculptor to the South Kensington Museum, (now the V and A). He moved with his wife to become Director of the Mayo School of Art in Lahore. ‘His contribution to the impact of the British Empire on India’s artistic heritage is still recognised and debated today’.

These photos are mine.

17-edmund-walker-queen-victoria-001

Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and three of their children at the Indian Pavilion of the Great Exhibition, by Prosper Lafaye

19-joseph-nash001

The Great Exhibition: India No 4, by Joseph Nash

21-pearlware-jug-decorated-by-j-l-kipling001

Pearlware jug, decorated by Lockwood Kipling

24-saddle-cloths001

These nineteenth century saddle cloths had embroidery every bit as rich and intricate as we had seen in the morning

26-rudolf-swoboda001

Student at the Mayo School, by Rudolf Swoboda

28-001

Rudyard Kipling illustrating his own stories

29-by-lockwood-for-rudyards-children001

Lockwood Kipling for his grandchildren

 

This next picture was I think my favourite exhibit.  I just loved how the reflected harsh Indian light had enabled the colourful details on the near, shaded, side to be picked out.

31-rudolf-swoboda001

A Peep at the Train by Rudolf Swoboda

Then as we returned again to the tearoom for final refreshment before making the journey back to Mary’s place, I couldn’t resist taking a photo of this in the Japanese section as we went through it.

 

33-susuki-masaya-1978-sprouting-box001

Sprouting Box, by Suzuki Masaya, 1978, in acrylic

35-p1250552001

Teatime

Two concluding exhibitions the next day…

Share this:

  • Tweet
  • Email

Like this:

Like Loading...

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent Posts

  • Norway 2022/23 – 12, An even quieter morning, though not without a degree of anxiety
  • Norway 2022/23 – 11, A quiet day
  • Norway 2022/23 – 10 New Year’s Eve
  • Norway 2022/23 – 9, Turnabouts and changes
  • Norway 2022/23 – 8, Hammerfest
  • Norway 2022/23 – 7, Kirkenes
January 2017
M T W T F S S
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
3031  
« Dec   Feb »

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015

Blogroll

  • Avalon Marshes 'Hands on Heritage'
  • Londonsenior
  • Salmon Brook Farms
  • The Jaguar
  • Tootlepedal's blog

Recent Comments

Musiewild on Norway 2022/23 – 12, An…
maryh on Norway 2022/23 – 12, An…
maryh on Norway 2022/23 – 12, An…
Musiewild on Norway 2022/23 – 5, Boxi…
Musiewild on Norway 2022/23 – 4, Chri…

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Blog at WordPress.com.

  • Follow Following
    • Musiewild's blog
    • Join 195 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Musiewild's blog
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    %d bloggers like this: