Post-Christmas, it was time for a bit of quiet. The exhibition was 'Modernism in Britain in the 1930s' - when artists including Piet Mondrian and Naum Gabo left the possibility of war in continental Europe, joining artists including Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson in Britain.
Given the uncertainty of the times, and perhaps from this distance, the works are strangely calm and comforting. In the 1930s, perhaps they were more confronting. Even so, none of these works imagine the horror and destabilisation that was to come, in Europe and in Asia. These works are quiet explorations of space.
Outside, on the Thames Embankment, the afternoon was black and bleakly cold. I made this drawing quickly, and went home to be warm.
Thursday, 30 December 2010
Tuesday, 21 December 2010
Heathrow is shut: rebooking flights in Cromwell Road, and the V&A
Well, I was supposed to fly on Sunday night, but Heathrow was iced-in. Monday morning held a visit to the airline office in Cromwell Road. 'You can try your luck on the wait-list tonight, if you go to the airport.' I was there with about 500 others in a long queue. Tuesday morning: back to the airline office and, success, a flight later tonight. What luck! I'll be home for Christmas.
In this part of town, and with a few hours to spare, I went to the Victoria & Albert Museum. This is such a treat - curiosity cabinets, western sculptures and tapestries, Asian artefacts and an exhibition of Buddhist sculpture in Asia. There were Buddhas, bodhisattvas and guardians from South Asia - Pakistan, India and Nepal - and from East Asia - China, Tibet and Japan.
The Indonesian temple of Borobudur, in Central Java, is apparently one of the largest. Every year, with chanting and lanterns, monks celebrate the birth, enlightenment and passing of Gautama the Buddha. The statues and reliefs are elaborately carved, the imagery moving from the mundane to the divine with the ascent of each terraced level.
Leaving the V&A, I caught the underground to Temple, and stood near the camel benches on the Embankment, apparently a reference to the 1916 Imperial Camel Corps. While I drew this cormorant, lunchtime joggers splashed behind me through the slush.
In this part of town, and with a few hours to spare, I went to the Victoria & Albert Museum. This is such a treat - curiosity cabinets, western sculptures and tapestries, Asian artefacts and an exhibition of Buddhist sculpture in Asia. There were Buddhas, bodhisattvas and guardians from South Asia - Pakistan, India and Nepal - and from East Asia - China, Tibet and Japan.
The Indonesian temple of Borobudur, in Central Java, is apparently one of the largest. Every year, with chanting and lanterns, monks celebrate the birth, enlightenment and passing of Gautama the Buddha. The statues and reliefs are elaborately carved, the imagery moving from the mundane to the divine with the ascent of each terraced level.
Leaving the V&A, I caught the underground to Temple, and stood near the camel benches on the Embankment, apparently a reference to the 1916 Imperial Camel Corps. While I drew this cormorant, lunchtime joggers splashed behind me through the slush.
Tuesday, 14 December 2010
A visit to the Courtauld Gallery
A little late - the weekend was busy with essays and exam prep.
But by Tuesday it was all over. I went to Somerset House to the exhibition of Cezanne's pipe smoking, card playing peasants. A lovely exhibition, preliminary drawings and character sketches beside final paintings. The artist at work.
Somerset House is also a treat - numerous exhibitions among the government offices, complex architecture of stairways and light wells, sculptures redolent of the Navy Board (an early tenant) and now, in winter, ice-skating in the courtyard. Apparently there are tombs downstairs, and a Catholic chapel from the 1600s.
I spent an afternoon once in Taman Prasasti in Jakarta, the park of memorial stones, complete with hearse, which offers a history of Europeans in tombstones from about 1690. There are monuments to military men with elaborate coats of arms and carved stone drums and bugles, governors, officials of the Dutch East India Company, a bishop, Olivia Marianne, the wife of Thomas Stamford Raffles, wealthy landowners, and scholars of theology, the Ramayana and archaeology.
At this time of year, Somerset House has a less tropical ambience. In search of sunshine again, I wandered down to the Embankment and made a drawing near Waterloo Bridge.
But by Tuesday it was all over. I went to Somerset House to the exhibition of Cezanne's pipe smoking, card playing peasants. A lovely exhibition, preliminary drawings and character sketches beside final paintings. The artist at work.
Somerset House is also a treat - numerous exhibitions among the government offices, complex architecture of stairways and light wells, sculptures redolent of the Navy Board (an early tenant) and now, in winter, ice-skating in the courtyard. Apparently there are tombs downstairs, and a Catholic chapel from the 1600s.
I spent an afternoon once in Taman Prasasti in Jakarta, the park of memorial stones, complete with hearse, which offers a history of Europeans in tombstones from about 1690. There are monuments to military men with elaborate coats of arms and carved stone drums and bugles, governors, officials of the Dutch East India Company, a bishop, Olivia Marianne, the wife of Thomas Stamford Raffles, wealthy landowners, and scholars of theology, the Ramayana and archaeology.
At this time of year, Somerset House has a less tropical ambience. In search of sunshine again, I wandered down to the Embankment and made a drawing near Waterloo Bridge.
Sunday, 5 December 2010
Bridget Riley at the National Gallery
There was new abstract work, painted directly onto the wall.
There was a film about influences - painters using colour in shape and direction - spoken by Bridget Riley.
There was a line of thought about perception as, after the Renaissance, painters moved away from belief in the existence of the traditional subjects of painting.
Abstraction in central Java has other meanings, printed on fabric - geometric patterns for the clothes of various types of court official and servant.
In batik shops in Jakarta, amongst the modern pieces, you can find metres of fabric with naive figurative patterns - farmers tilling rice fields, foreign armies with cannon, modern armies with tanks, kings hunting with their retinues, and the ultramodern motifs of the ultrarich - moguls playing golf, with their golf buggies.
Walking down to Jubilee Bridge the midday winter sun was blinding, ferociously hot, after a week of snow and ice. I made a drawing of sun.
There was a film about influences - painters using colour in shape and direction - spoken by Bridget Riley.
There was a line of thought about perception as, after the Renaissance, painters moved away from belief in the existence of the traditional subjects of painting.
Abstraction in central Java has other meanings, printed on fabric - geometric patterns for the clothes of various types of court official and servant.
In batik shops in Jakarta, amongst the modern pieces, you can find metres of fabric with naive figurative patterns - farmers tilling rice fields, foreign armies with cannon, modern armies with tanks, kings hunting with their retinues, and the ultramodern motifs of the ultrarich - moguls playing golf, with their golf buggies.
Walking down to Jubilee Bridge the midday winter sun was blinding, ferociously hot, after a week of snow and ice. I made a drawing of sun.
Sunday, 28 November 2010
A visit to St Paul's Cathedral
Ludgate was not crowded. There had been talk of snow. Perhaps some people stayed home.
Inside the Cathedral visitors hovered near the western entrance. I stood near the racks of candles and cast my eyes down the nave - past the Duke of Wellington Monument, past the dome, to a person near the high altar making ready for evensong.
Turning around and looking up, there were electronic trumpets on either side of the walkway that joins the north and south corridors of the triforium, high above the worshippers. I'll have to come back another day to see its hidden treasures.
Just before leaving Jakarta I visited Gereja Sion (De Nieuwe Portugueesche Buitenkerk), thought to be the oldest remaining church in the city - built from 1693-1695, with a bell cast in Batavia in 1675 and an 18th century pipe organ. The church is still in use, with electric guitars to complement the organ and elaborate floral arrangements from Cikini flower market. Built on marsh, about 10,000 wooden piles support the brick, granite and ebony structure.
It's dark early these days. I caught the DLR from Bank to Limehouse and booked Christmas lunch at a place on the river. I made this drawing looking across the water to Canary Wharf.
Inside the Cathedral visitors hovered near the western entrance. I stood near the racks of candles and cast my eyes down the nave - past the Duke of Wellington Monument, past the dome, to a person near the high altar making ready for evensong.
Turning around and looking up, there were electronic trumpets on either side of the walkway that joins the north and south corridors of the triforium, high above the worshippers. I'll have to come back another day to see its hidden treasures.
Just before leaving Jakarta I visited Gereja Sion (De Nieuwe Portugueesche Buitenkerk), thought to be the oldest remaining church in the city - built from 1693-1695, with a bell cast in Batavia in 1675 and an 18th century pipe organ. The church is still in use, with electric guitars to complement the organ and elaborate floral arrangements from Cikini flower market. Built on marsh, about 10,000 wooden piles support the brick, granite and ebony structure.
It's dark early these days. I caught the DLR from Bank to Limehouse and booked Christmas lunch at a place on the river. I made this drawing looking across the water to Canary Wharf.
Sunday, 21 November 2010
A visit to the Tower of London
It was time to visit one of the iconic sights - the Jewel House at the Tower of London - to see the treasures of the kingdom of England.
The magnificence of the crowns was in the shimmering textures of gems, offset by the softness of velvet and ermine. The coronation and banqueting plate was enlivened by motifs of heraldry and Christianity, wrought in the gold.
In Jakarta, treasures of the kingdom of Mataram (752-1045) are displayed at the National Museum - jewellery, coins and plate with motifs of the Ramayana, wrought in the gold. These motifs of the Hindu Ramayana are repeated in other larger carved-stone treasures of Mataram, at Prambanan temple in Central Java.
In the chill afternoon air, outside the walls of the Tower of London, an iceskating rink was lively and noisy. I saw another rink the other day, perhaps more for adults at Canary Wharf, a bit further down the Thames.
Jakarta also caters for ice-skating enthusiasts, with a year-round rink in Taman Anggrek (orchid garden), a major shopping mall. Half is for free-skating and half for coaching the local talent.
The air became icy. I walked up the Thames past Customs House and Old Billingsgate Market, towards London Bridge, and made this drawing.
The magnificence of the crowns was in the shimmering textures of gems, offset by the softness of velvet and ermine. The coronation and banqueting plate was enlivened by motifs of heraldry and Christianity, wrought in the gold.
In Jakarta, treasures of the kingdom of Mataram (752-1045) are displayed at the National Museum - jewellery, coins and plate with motifs of the Ramayana, wrought in the gold. These motifs of the Hindu Ramayana are repeated in other larger carved-stone treasures of Mataram, at Prambanan temple in Central Java.
In the chill afternoon air, outside the walls of the Tower of London, an iceskating rink was lively and noisy. I saw another rink the other day, perhaps more for adults at Canary Wharf, a bit further down the Thames.
Jakarta also caters for ice-skating enthusiasts, with a year-round rink in Taman Anggrek (orchid garden), a major shopping mall. Half is for free-skating and half for coaching the local talent.
The air became icy. I walked up the Thames past Customs House and Old Billingsgate Market, towards London Bridge, and made this drawing.
Sunday, 14 November 2010
A visit to Kew Gardens
It seemed like a good idea to visit Kew before autumn set in.
We waited in the first explorer bus of the day at 11.00 am, and listened to the minute silence broadcast by the BBC for Remembrance Day. The announcer said the Royal Family was assembled at Whitehall to lay wreaths. The bus set off through Kew Gardens when the gun at Horse Guards marked the end of the silence.
The sky and the foliage were dripping water. It was fresh and damp. In the shadows, under the shelter of low branches, iridescent blue peacocks gathered, and long-tailed golden pheasants with dusky red feathers.
There was a lily pond, with a small variety of waterlily. I thought of the giant lily pads in the gardens at Bogor, two hours drive south of Jakarta. It was a place for family photographs, and a magnet for small boys hurling stones. The pond at Kew was a much more restful place.
I went out of the Gardens to stand on the bank of the Thames, and made this drawing while it rained.
We waited in the first explorer bus of the day at 11.00 am, and listened to the minute silence broadcast by the BBC for Remembrance Day. The announcer said the Royal Family was assembled at Whitehall to lay wreaths. The bus set off through Kew Gardens when the gun at Horse Guards marked the end of the silence.
The sky and the foliage were dripping water. It was fresh and damp. In the shadows, under the shelter of low branches, iridescent blue peacocks gathered, and long-tailed golden pheasants with dusky red feathers.
There was a lily pond, with a small variety of waterlily. I thought of the giant lily pads in the gardens at Bogor, two hours drive south of Jakarta. It was a place for family photographs, and a magnet for small boys hurling stones. The pond at Kew was a much more restful place.
I went out of the Gardens to stand on the bank of the Thames, and made this drawing while it rained.
Sunday, 7 November 2010
A visit to the Tate Gallery
I went to see the Turner Prize exhibition, and the Joseph Mallord William Turner paintings.
The Turner Prize is awarded for contemporary art. Visitors moved slowly through the works. It was a thought-provoking exhibition.
The JMW Turner paintings were much more accessible to my eye - although apparently not in his day. He was criticised as a romantic, following an entirely personal vision in his representations of water, sky and light in London and Venice. In the adjoining room there were eight small etchings by William Blake, hand-coloured and sombre. Again, these were well-known forms but smaller than the familiar book reproductions and intense, pulling one into intricate enclosed space quite different from the sense of immensity in the Turner paintings.
Outside the Gallery, as darkness fell, I walked across the road to the Thames. The whiz-banging of fireworks started up again, as it had every night this week - an extended bonfire night - a lengthy tribute to Guy Fawkes and the gunpowder plot.
In Jakarta, Chinese New Year is a like this - fireworks every night for a week. Drinking tea and sitting in my favourite armchair on the eighteenth floor, I watched coloured sparks hurtle into the sky, explode into shimmering gold, and fade away, in one part of the Chinese quarter after another.
I stood on the Millbank Millenium Pier to make a drawing of the lights from the Albert Embankment.
The Turner Prize is awarded for contemporary art. Visitors moved slowly through the works. It was a thought-provoking exhibition.
The JMW Turner paintings were much more accessible to my eye - although apparently not in his day. He was criticised as a romantic, following an entirely personal vision in his representations of water, sky and light in London and Venice. In the adjoining room there were eight small etchings by William Blake, hand-coloured and sombre. Again, these were well-known forms but smaller than the familiar book reproductions and intense, pulling one into intricate enclosed space quite different from the sense of immensity in the Turner paintings.
Outside the Gallery, as darkness fell, I walked across the road to the Thames. The whiz-banging of fireworks started up again, as it had every night this week - an extended bonfire night - a lengthy tribute to Guy Fawkes and the gunpowder plot.
In Jakarta, Chinese New Year is a like this - fireworks every night for a week. Drinking tea and sitting in my favourite armchair on the eighteenth floor, I watched coloured sparks hurtle into the sky, explode into shimmering gold, and fade away, in one part of the Chinese quarter after another.
I stood on the Millbank Millenium Pier to make a drawing of the lights from the Albert Embankment.
Sunday, 31 October 2010
The National Gallery once more...
In the Gallery I stayed with Peter Paul Rubens - classical and Biblical scenes, vigorous movement and voluptuous figures in glowing colour.
Outside, daylight saving was gone. The Hindu Festival of Lights - Diwali - was celebrated with electrifying dance in Trafalgar Square. I looked on from the steps of the National Gallery - more vigorous movement and voluptuous figures in glowing colour.
Jakarta doesn't have daylight saving, being closer to the Equator. Wet season or dry season, all year round, it's light by about 6.00 am and dark by about 6.00 pm. I waited for the long days of summer, but they never came. But if there are differences, there are similarities. Now, east of Jakarta on the island of Bali, Indonesians also celebrate the Festival of Lights.
As I walked down to Jubilee Bridge the sounds of Diwali faded. On the Bridge I made a drawing, steering clear of Halloween revellers in Edvard Munch 'Scream' masks, while carousel music from South Bank mingled with the tooting and shouting from Thames party cruises.
Sunday, 24 October 2010
The National Gallery again...
I ran down to the National Gallery just before closing, to spend time with the Van Goghs and, as it turned out, quite a few French families. Nearby was an 1891 Henri Rousseau - 'Surprised!' - a startled tiger in jungle.
Earlier in the week I'd been to the zoo. London is a city of lion statues - outside the British Museum - at the Houses of Parliament - on the coat of arms. I wanted to see the real animal, and found a family of Asian lions, dozing.
Nearby was the glass enclosure of a young male Sumatran tiger, neither dozing nor surprised but pacing endlessly, to the mystery and the delight of gathering families.
In Sumatra, the large Indonesian island, to the north of Java, these tigers are becoming endangered. 'The Jakarta Post' reports increasing 'human-tiger' conflicts as forest areas decrease, and annual forest fires blanket Singapore and parts of Malaysia in heavy smoke haze.
At closing time, I walked out of the Gallery, past the lion statues in Trafalgar Square, past the statue of Richard the Lionheart outside the Houses of Parliament, to a place just upriver of Lambeth Bridge, where I stopped and made this drawing.
Earlier in the week I'd been to the zoo. London is a city of lion statues - outside the British Museum - at the Houses of Parliament - on the coat of arms. I wanted to see the real animal, and found a family of Asian lions, dozing.
Nearby was the glass enclosure of a young male Sumatran tiger, neither dozing nor surprised but pacing endlessly, to the mystery and the delight of gathering families.
In Sumatra, the large Indonesian island, to the north of Java, these tigers are becoming endangered. 'The Jakarta Post' reports increasing 'human-tiger' conflicts as forest areas decrease, and annual forest fires blanket Singapore and parts of Malaysia in heavy smoke haze.
At closing time, I walked out of the Gallery, past the lion statues in Trafalgar Square, past the statue of Richard the Lionheart outside the Houses of Parliament, to a place just upriver of Lambeth Bridge, where I stopped and made this drawing.
Sunday, 17 October 2010
A visit to the National Gallery
I stayed with the Renaissance Italians, seen so many times in books and now, in the original.
The outlines were familiar, but the colours so much more intense. It also took a while to adjust to the size of the works.
What is there of the Renaissance in Jakarta? Galleries exhibit modern Indonesian sculptors and painters.
Perhaps the Renaissance is reflected at third or fourth remove in the Graeco-Roman features of Dutch colonial buildings - in the colonnades, pediments and atria of palaces, museums and courts.
I took a tour of the state rooms of the Presidential Palace during the school holidays, along with hundreds of school children in uniform, and their parents. They had travelled all night by bus for a day in Jakarta, and would travel all night to go home, taking with them their photographs to show their friends where they had been, what they had seen.
After the Gallery I stood on the Thames Embankment near Lambeth Bridge, among people photographing the Houses of Parliament, to draw at dusk.
The outlines were familiar, but the colours so much more intense. It also took a while to adjust to the size of the works.
What is there of the Renaissance in Jakarta? Galleries exhibit modern Indonesian sculptors and painters.
Perhaps the Renaissance is reflected at third or fourth remove in the Graeco-Roman features of Dutch colonial buildings - in the colonnades, pediments and atria of palaces, museums and courts.
I took a tour of the state rooms of the Presidential Palace during the school holidays, along with hundreds of school children in uniform, and their parents. They had travelled all night by bus for a day in Jakarta, and would travel all night to go home, taking with them their photographs to show their friends where they had been, what they had seen.
After the Gallery I stood on the Thames Embankment near Lambeth Bridge, among people photographing the Houses of Parliament, to draw at dusk.
Sunday, 10 October 2010
A visit to the National Portrait Gallery
Pictures of the grand and the famous, by the grand and the famous.
And some unexpected treats - life drawings by Bridget Riley, before she became celebrated for her abstracts (seen last week at the Tate Modern). In the 20th century collections, I didn't recall having seen previously so many depictions of Winston Churchill at so many ages. And a special little exhibition of drawings of Rome, made when English travel to the Continent was possible after the Napoleonic Wars.
In Jakarta, portraiture is a vibrant art. In the realm of the grand and the famous, larger-than-life-size portraits of each visiting head of state and spouse, freshly-painted, are mounted in Medan Merdeka (Freedom Square) beside portraits of the Indonesian President and spouse. They all face the Presidential Palace, across the road, for the length of the official visit.
And for those who would like a portrait, whether famous or not, the street stalls of the portrait-makers can be found several blocks away, near Pasar Baru, on the banks of the Ciliwung. Their stalls face Gedung Kesenian (Arts Building) which, in 1821, replaced the Municipal Theatre built by Thomas Stamford Raffles when he was Lieutenant-Governor of Java during the Napoleonic Wars.
After the Gallery I wandered down Whitehall to the Thames, to the Egyptian obelisk near Waterloo Bridge. I made a drawing at sunset.
And some unexpected treats - life drawings by Bridget Riley, before she became celebrated for her abstracts (seen last week at the Tate Modern). In the 20th century collections, I didn't recall having seen previously so many depictions of Winston Churchill at so many ages. And a special little exhibition of drawings of Rome, made when English travel to the Continent was possible after the Napoleonic Wars.
In Jakarta, portraiture is a vibrant art. In the realm of the grand and the famous, larger-than-life-size portraits of each visiting head of state and spouse, freshly-painted, are mounted in Medan Merdeka (Freedom Square) beside portraits of the Indonesian President and spouse. They all face the Presidential Palace, across the road, for the length of the official visit.
And for those who would like a portrait, whether famous or not, the street stalls of the portrait-makers can be found several blocks away, near Pasar Baru, on the banks of the Ciliwung. Their stalls face Gedung Kesenian (Arts Building) which, in 1821, replaced the Municipal Theatre built by Thomas Stamford Raffles when he was Lieutenant-Governor of Java during the Napoleonic Wars.
After the Gallery I wandered down Whitehall to the Thames, to the Egyptian obelisk near Waterloo Bridge. I made a drawing at sunset.
Sunday, 3 October 2010
A visit to the Tate Modern Gallery
Time away from settling in and signing up. Time to settle down
This was my first visit to the Gallery. On a rainy London Sunday, with a major exhibition showing, it was crowded. I stayed on Level 5 for a while - Andy Warhol, Mark Rothko, Roy Lichtenstein, Jackson Pollock. And when the rain eased, I wandered down to the pebbled southern bank of the Thames, exposed at low tide. It was another world of seagulls, distant ferries, and rusty anchors.
Over the past few days I've seen a few pedicabs in London. Jakarta banned pedicabs ('becak') years ago. A hindrance to traffic, they were loaded in barges and dumped at sea. There weren't many barges on the Thames today.
I sat on one of the anchors to make this drawing of a buoy under the Blackfriars rail bridge.
This was my first visit to the Gallery. On a rainy London Sunday, with a major exhibition showing, it was crowded. I stayed on Level 5 for a while - Andy Warhol, Mark Rothko, Roy Lichtenstein, Jackson Pollock. And when the rain eased, I wandered down to the pebbled southern bank of the Thames, exposed at low tide. It was another world of seagulls, distant ferries, and rusty anchors.
Over the past few days I've seen a few pedicabs in London. Jakarta banned pedicabs ('becak') years ago. A hindrance to traffic, they were loaded in barges and dumped at sea. There weren't many barges on the Thames today.
I sat on one of the anchors to make this drawing of a buoy under the Blackfriars rail bridge.
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