tomb of the unknown craftsman

For my birthday a few years ago, I got this from the Tate Modern, which I love. For christmas this year, Babs got me the new one made to accompany the Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman exhibition at the British Museum.







It's beautiful, can't wait to get some twin frames for them both. The exhibition is on until mid February, so go if you get the chance, it's brilliant, one of the few exhibitions you'll see where people actually laugh out loud as they walk around it. I took some pictures of Alan Measles' pilgrimage motorbike on my iPhone (it's not Alan Measles in the box, it's one of his stunt doubles).





Hope everyone had a good christmas.

Seeds at the Tate

Well, you all know about the latest Turbine Hall farce. (If not, read about it here).

The health and safety concerns seem entirely justifiable, my qualm is that at no point was there any foresight into the fact that this might have been the case. I am no expert, but I think if I was putting months into planning this exhibition it might have occurred to me that porcelain, when trod upon MAY release a dust, and when there are as many pieces of porcelain as there are internet users in China, and people are being actively encouraged to tred on them, the dust might be a bit of a problem.

So I visited after it had been closed off, but I have to admit there was still something quite beautiful about the visuals of it, but it definitely lacked much power as it was clearly supposed to be an interactive piece. As it is, it's quite embarrassing and pitiful, but could have had potential to be one of the more powerful pieces the Turbine Hall has had.

elephants, quilts and the holocaust

I've just finished three days at uni of lectures, seminars and museum and gallery visits for my 'Artefacts as educational resources' module. Thought I'd share some pictures I took.

Our first stop was the Wellcome Collection to see the Medicine Man and Medicine Now exhibitions. Both of which were very interesting, especially the former, and I found them a lot more engaging than I thought I would given that my interest in and understanding of science is limited. Ken Arnold, the one of the curators for both gave us a short talk and answered questions.

Secondly we visited the John Soane museum, which is an unusual cluttered and disorganised mass of seemingly unrelated artefacts displayed throughout John Soane's house. I found the staff very frosty and elitist, but very knowledgeable about the collections. It was an interesting visit, but I'm not sure how much I really got out of it. The house itself was the sole exhibit in my view, not the individual items in the collection.

The following day we went to the Holocaust exhibition at the Imperial War Museum. Needless to say it was one of the most profoundly stirring and emotive exhibitions I have been to. Beforehand we went to a handling session called In their Shoes, which involved having a freelance Holocaust educator building up narratives about the war around shoes, it was an interesting learning experience, but it was very manipulative, I opted out of handling the shoes because I (successfully) predicted how the session would work, ie: you're holding a shoe trying to gather some clues about when and where it was from and then it would be announced that the shoe was from a pile of shoes removed from Jews who were stripped of all of their belongings when entering the death camps. I really felt for the girl who was holding that particular shoe when it was revealed. I'm not really comfortable with those kind of shock tactics, when I think the truth alone is just as horrifying. The exhibition also had manipulative elements to it, but I wasn't offended by that, as it was a really thorough and well-considered exhibition. It's the only exhibition in which I have been moved to tears, I also learnt an awful lot, and I think that as pop culture is drenched in world war II references it's easy to think you know everything about it, but I was suprised and a little ashamed at how ignorant I was about it. I definitely recommend a visit to anyone who hasn't been.

Here are some snaps from outside the IWM:





This was the first thing I saw in the grounds of the IWM after the exhibition, pretty profound I would say given that it was such a harrowing and eye-opening experience.



On the last day we visited the V and A to see the quilts exhibition. I was particularly looking forward to this one, as it had a piece by Grayson Perry in it, and I figured it would be pretty pertinent to my assignment.

Here is the Chihuly chandelier from the atrium:

The exhibition lived up to expectations, it was an interesting slice of history, although I found the contemporary pieces most exciting, definitely worth a visit.

Here is a detail from the perry quilt Right to Life. I loved it, but was angry about it's display. It's about abortion, but was displayed behind a quilt covered in scriptures, which I thought was a bit obvious and tedious, and it meant you couldn't get right up to it, and had to look at it from about two meters away. Apart from that though, no complaints!

Spotted my favourite of the elephants outside the V and A aswell:

and another good one, I love these being in London, I wish they were permanent.

Trevor Bell

I finally made it to the Stanley and Audrey Burton Gallery to see the Trevor Bell exhibition in its final week. It's a wonder that it's taken me so long to see, as I work in the same building as the gallery. but I got there in the end. Probably more spurred on by the fact that no else I had spoken to who had been was very impressed.



Well, I absolutely loved it. Unfortunately I couldn't find any good pictures of the pieces on display, but they were all white with splashes of navy and black. However, the most impressive pieces were where you saw white on white, which was only discernable thanks to the texture, which was often only apparent when you manoeuvred yourself so that the light hit it at the right angle.

The curved shapes of the canvases (I feel like canvi should be the plural, but i acknowledge that it is not) looks impressive in pictures, but in the flesh it's an absolute work of genius. My favourite part of each was that right on the rim of the frame, practically touching the wall and seemingly invisible until you practically crawled into the paintings (which i pretty much did) was a really thin line of colour, some of them a really intense pink or a deep blue, and once you'd spotted this is gave each piece a whole new hue when you looked at it. These pieces certainly didn't end with the canvas- the walls were as much a part of it.

I was so pleasantly suprised by this, I guess in my ignorance I presumed that they would transfix me in the way Rothko does, which I have to view from at least 8 feet to feel like I'm seeing them properly, but with Bell's work, I literally investigated the whole architecture of each piece, I had to navigate my way round every curve and bend and every change in texture and bump on the surface. They were totally more than strong brush work; the concept, the canvas, the execution were all apparent when viewing.

In trying to find some pictures of this exhibition I stumbled across a picture of one of his older pieces, which I think looks just as beautiful, albeit a little less challenging. I'm certainly eager to see more.