Two great exhibitions in one with thanks to our Queen Elizabeth!

There is a gallery at Buckingham Palace called, unsurprisingly, the Queen's Gallery, which I've visited several times and have seen some excellent exhibitions including Scott and Shackleton in 2011. This year they have excelled themselves by putting on 2 shows at the same time and I was lucky enough to be invited to the preview. 

The posters are intriguing and when I delved into the early publicity I was hooked - how was the gallery going to make sense for us of a 17th century little know Italian artist and 100 plus brand new works from the Royal Academy? As the curator, Martin Clayton, said: "On the surface these two exhibitions might seem very different but they are surprisingly complementary. Both show the work of artists who have pushed the boundaries".

The Castiglione show is title 'Lost Genius' because his work has been out of the public gaze for so long and also because his tempestuous life lost him success and recognition during his lifetime. His paintings are wonderful and, as we learned, he painted with oils directly on to paper and you can see how the oils have bled through to the reverse. He was the first artist to use monotype as a method, so called because only one print is made from each engraving (except for rare circumstances)

This poster greets you with the self portrait faintly printed

Self portrait print

The main exhibition room

How the work displayed

Sacred and Profane Love  Mid 1630s

The Crossing of the Red Sea mid to late 1630s

The front of one painting

The reverse of the same painting

Omnia vanitas Early to mid 1650s

Castiglione was born in 1609 in Genoa, a cosmopolitan city that probably made him open to a wider world and new possibilities. He began in the pastoral tradition using oil on paper but moved onto Rome and looked to reinvent himself, examining other artists' work and incorporating their techniques, finding he was most keen on Poussin. 

Back in Genoa he was poised to be a truly great artist through his painting and print- making but his temper got the better of him (as had happened previously in his career) and he had to flee his home town in disguise!

He found stability back in Rome, continued his work and introduced some colour into his paintings, as we see in the later part of the exhibition, but he died at 55 years of age.  His work was appreciated after his death but by the 19th century his popularity had waned and his work has been little seen on this country until this new show at the Queen's Gallery. The Queen has a major collection of his work, normally held in Windsor Castle.

An unusual 2nd print from a monotype  Mid 1650s

Later painting when Castliglione introduced some colour

 Quite overwhelmed by part one of the exhibition we then moved onto Gifted, which gave us a wonderful tour around the work of many of the best artists in this country. The Royal Academy has a long tradition of giving gifts to the monarch since they were founded in 1768.  For the Diamond Jubilee the Royal Academy of Arts asked each of its academicians to send in one piece of their work on paper and over one hundred pieces were submitted.  Seven red silk covered boxes of the finest contemporary British graphic art arrived and the staff had the privilege of opening them, not knowing what would be inside. 

I was bowled over by the Queen's Gallery's first contemporary exhibition where one great piece was hung next to another and another - luckily the curator's job was not to select but to display them all to their best advantage.  It was a dazzling who's who from so many familiar names doing what they do so well but also a chance to see work on paper from artists more well know for other media. 

The silk covered boxes

Anish Kapoor in 2 D!

Sir Anthony Caro away from his sculptures

Lord Foster - a School for Sierra Leone

Grayson Perry

Anthony Gormley

Tracey Emin

Professor Richard Wilson having a bit of fun!

Professor Michael Sandle

Professor Chris Orr - View from Cleopatra's Needle

Professor Maurice Cockrill

Turning back as we left I spotted the very inviting, and rather over the top, entrance closed until the grand opening the following day.  Both exhibitions are well worth a visit so do put them on your list - and there's a great shop for Christmas presents on the way out!

Let's see what next week has in store....

Bye for now.
Sue
@itsyourlondon
www.itsyourlondon.co.uk

Is it art? A visit to Frieze Fair London

That big question - what is art? I've been to thousands of art exhibitions and galleries, taken tens of art courses and I still have no real answer to that question but I don't think I'm alone in this dilemma. Is it in the eye of the beholder? Like beauty, there is usually some agreement on what is and what is not but there is also space for the quirky one offs. 

October in London sees the great and the good (and the bad) in the art world gathering at Frieze Art Fair. Collectors and artists from all over the world can be found in the enormous tents pitched in Regent's Park for 4 days of schmoozing and being seen and trying to spot the next big thing so they can say they 'found them ages ago'! 

I was lucky enough to be invited to the evening preview (big thanks to The Marylebone Hotel, London, part of the Doyle Collection) so I got to wander around, with my glass of champagne, checking out the art before the crowds piled in the next morning.  I took loads of photos so I could  share the fair with you. I make no judgement and some are pretty 'out there' but I hope you enjoy your virtual Frieze and for those of you who like a bit of people watching, scroll towards the end of the photos and you'll see some of the fashions.....

 

This one's interactive - you could sit in the middle!

Here are just a few photos of the people at the fair who were mostly dressed up and some in amazing outfits but there were also a few jeans and grubby trainer types too but no photos of them!

 Coinciding with Frieze are loads of new openings at London's great museums and art galleries so watch out for future blogs about these and some more unexpected openings!  I'm not giving any clues about that but watch this space.......

Bye for now,
Sue
@itsyourlondon
www.itsyourlondon.co.uk 

Day trips from London: the ancient sites of Stonehenge and Avebury

Now and again even I feel the need to head out of London to explore the wonderful countryside in the UK, whether it's further afield to Scotland or to the great sights all around London. My most recent excursion took in not one but two Unesco World Heritage Sites, both within an easy day trip.

Our two sites were Stonehenge and Avebury and here's what the Unesco folk have to say about them: "Stonehenge and Avebury, in Wiltshire, are among the most famous groups of megaliths in the world. The two sanctuaries consist of circles of menhirs arranged in a pattern whose astronomical significance is still being explored. These holy places and the nearby Neolithic sites are an incomparable testimony to prehistoric times". And " Stonehenge is the most architecturally sophisticated prehistoric stone circle in the world, while Avebury is the largest in the world".  So, armed with that inspiring description, we set off! 

Stonehenge is just a couple of hours drive from central London and as you approach you can catch glimpses of the stone circle before you actually drive past it on the way to the car park. There is considerable controversy about this road and there are plans to redirect it through a tunnel to return Stonehenge to its dominating position in the countryside but who knows when and evenif that will happen and in the meantime the A303 rumbles past. 

Once parked up, we headed into the site with great excitement, our only sadness was the murky weather in the middle of a sunny week but it added a more mysterious atmosphere and some moody photos. I was surprised how close we were to the stones as I had heard that visitors were kept well away for fear of people touching and damaging the stones. The stones are huge, the largest weighing over 40 tons, and so many remain in position that it is not hard to imagine how the massive circle could have looked back in the prehistoric times.  Many stories are told of why it was built but no one can be sure whether it was ceremonial, religious or astronomical - or all of these or something else entirely!

 As a visitor you follow a circular path and walk right around the large circle so you can see the stones from every angle armed with a very informative audio guide. You can spend as long as you like marvelling at this extraordinary 5,000 year old structure and let your imagination go....

Here are a few photos so you can see what all the fuss is about:

Add caption

Zooming in to see the stones

From Stonehenge it's just a 45  minute drive to Avebury the second of the UNESCO monments and the largest stone circle in the world!  It's completely different in that the circle is so large that it encompasses the village of Avebury and has several roads bisecting it, which gives it the sense of being an integral part of life here. The stones themselves are smaller and are very spread out but you can walk round tracing the circle which disappears in parts where the stones have been take away - such well hewn stones were too good for the locals not to reuse in nearby buildings.  Avebury is a lovely village with many beautiful houses from a range of different eras and a good looking pub - of course! 

The circles, there are more than one as several appear within the wider outside circle, date from about 3,600 BCE. Again we don't know why it was built and it is intriguing to read that as many as 15 of the giant stones, or megaliths, are buried on the site as during the early 14th century locals pulled down and buried the stones as they believed they were the work of the devil. You can imagine how that would happen as the effort taken to move these giant stones into place would have seemed superhuman to them.

Here are some photos to compare with Stonehenge:

 

 
There is so much more I could tell you about Stonehenge and Avebury and I've just given you a few highlights so do look them up online and try to get to visit one or both sites if you can. 

Back in London next week so bye for now.
Sue
@itsyourlondon
www.itsyourlondon.co.uk