On the Beat

When I was at Tate Modern recently, I went into the space of the turbine hall. I wasn't overly impressed by the installation by Richard Tuttle, but I was very pleased to see the ghost of "Shibboleth". This was an installation by Doris Salcedo - maybe not so much an installation as an "exstillation", the removal of part of the floor to create a vast crack in the substance of the building.

It was a very powerful piece: the absence of matter.

When it was finished, the crack was filled in, and some of the floor slabs were replaced. But in places you can still see where the crack ran, like a ghost of the original artwork: the absence of matter is filled, removing the art but leaving its memory.

Before


After

I don't often take photographs of art-works, because there is little that a photographer can add.

The exception is sculpture, where the subtleties of shade and texture can be reflected in a photograph: the way one see a piece is open to interpretation, and that can be captured in a photograph.

I was going past the National Gallery of Scotland today and I thought I would pop in to see Rodin's "The Kiss", which they have on load (until next March, I think).

It is a truly stunning, evocative piece. It is strange how cold stone can contain so much life.

I forgot to include these in my post on public art in Edinburgh yesterday...

St Bernard's Well.

North Bridge.

Specifically, the monument to the King's Own Scottish Borderers.

Near my flat is a former church called the Mansfield Traquair. Built as a "Catholic Apostolic church", it was decorated with murals by Anna Phoebe Traquair. Long since decomissioned and having had an err... lively existence, the murals have been restored.

It is a remarkable building.

I’ve just been to the Lucian Freud retrospective at the National Portrait Gallery, and I have a lot of somewhat contradictory views about his work. This isn’t surprising, since the exhibition spans seventy years – the first painting, a self portrait, dates from 1940 (when Freud was only 18), the last, an portrait of his studio assistant, unfinished at Freud’s death in 2011.

The early-early pictures are very detailed but somewhat distorted portraits: even then, he painted what he saw rather than what others would have liked to see. What he saw was attractive, though: over time, that changed, as if he saw people as meat – living meat, perhaps, but meat nonetheless.

He was very good at painting eyes, however: the eyes were always alive, reflecting the light, in contrast to the flesh he painted later on.

His later pictures seemed uncomfortably voyeuristic, perhaps because I knew that he was painting his wives (he had several), his lovers (many more) and his children (from both wives and lovers). Many of his nudes appear quite sexual despite also appearing like dead meat – quite a feat, I think.

He painted several composite pictures – two or more people in the same picture, but sitting at different times; and frankly he wasn’t that good at stitching them together… The dimensions are wrong: in “Large Interior, W9”, the nude behind his seated mother just looks really out of proportion, whilst the harlequin in “Large Interior, W11 (After Watteau)” looks outsized, misshapen and contorted.

The way he painted nudes – sexual but dead – creates a strange tension. The knowledge of his relationships adds to this. He seems to have had sex with a great many of his models. (He painted the Queen, too. I wonder…) The pictures can be disturbing. There is real sense of mortality in a lot of his work – perhaps because the nudes so often look like corpses. (It may, of course, just be me.) Even the self portraits look a bit dead.

There are several photographs shown as well – most by David Dawson, his last studio assistant, but also images by Henri Cartier Bresson and photographers from Freud’s Soho drinking circle. These said more to me about Freud than his paintings, perhaps because I relate to photographs. Which is again a little disturbing. Was he really so hidden? (In his self portrait “Interior with Plant, Reflection, Listening” he disappears – only part of his body is painted: so perhaps his painting was all about hiding.)

I stuck this on my Posterous bolg on Thursday, but thinking about it, I felt it belonged here. So I'm cross-posting... [I can't really work out what to use Posterous for. If I didn't have LJ, Posterous would make sense, but I do... I have a Posterous account because a project I was collaborating on had a Posterous site, and I need to log in!]

I spend a couple of hours at Tate Liverpool today. It is over a decade since I last visited.

It is a great gallery: a wonderful building, and a very good size - there's a lot there, but you can cover it all in an hour and a half or so.

There were two exhibitions on: Touched, part of the Liverpool Biennial, and displays from the permanent collections - three different views, each curated by a different artist - Carol Ann Duffy, Wayne Hemingway, and Michael Craig Martin.

I wasn't too impressed by the quality of the art in Touched - but it really made me think, which I guess means it worked, at least on some level. I didn't like the art, but instead I liked the ideas. Is the art the artefact or the idea?

There were two pieces - both installations - that grabbed my attention. One, by Eva Kot'atkova (I hope I got that right!) was all about stories we tell: it was called "Stories from the Living Room". Everywhere I go, stories and the ongoing narrative seem to dominate. Yesterday I ran a workshop for a client to establish the story for an individual customer - that was their language, not mine. Narrative seems to be the driving idea - the narrative, even - for our time.

The other piece I liked was by Jamie Isentein. "Empire of Fire" featured lighted candles, safety equipment, and the set of Jean-Paul Sartre's stage play "No Exit". And Ms Isenstein's hand. It was full of humour, but really disturbing - positively spooky.

The curated displays from the permanent collection were full of school visits. Loud, but not unruly - they were very well behaved. Carl Andre's "144 Magnesium Squares" was surrounded by kids. Most pieces were protected by signs prohibiting use touching or markers to make us keep our distance; not the Andre. But no one went too close: it was surrounded by kids keeping their distance. This was strange. I asked one of the many Tate staff if one could walk on it, and he said yes - he was amused by the way no one dared step onto the metallic squares. So I did - to the horror of the schoolkids. Suddenly I, rather than the art, took their attention. It felt like I was participating in the art.

The permanent collection has pieces from many of my favourite artists - Richard Long (two pieces on display - a word-piece and a slate circle), Anthony Gormley, lots of Picasso, Donald Judd. It was wonderful walking around looking at these works. Magic.

I am aware I haven’t been writing on LJ much recently. It’s nothing personal, but I do think it would be healthy to write some more. I often have a running list of things won’t to write about, so maybe I should by catching up a bit… Also because I want to show off my photographs! (Why else do I post?)

Back in January, I saw the Alyn Cosker quartet play in London. I meant to write about it at the time, but it got lost in a trip away; and also – well, it was good, but really not my kind of music. It is harder to write about things I don’t like so much (but maybe a useful trick).

I know Cosker from his work with Scottish National Jazz Orchestra and Tommy Smith; he can be a very loud brash drummer, but he can also be very gentle and delicate, too – a rare mix.

His own music is strictly jazz fusion – the bits fused being rock-funk. He plays in complex time signatures, with great energy – there wasn’t so much of the thoughtful, gentle Cosker here.

He featured Seamus Blake on saxophone – another forceful, muscular player. It sounded to me like he was playing what he would have played in any other setting – as if there wasn’t a natural fit to their music.

Mike Janisch was on bass – both electric and acoustic. I much preferred the sound of his acoustic playing – acoustic bass just seems so much more subtle.

( cut for length; and pictures! )

Last weekend, I spent an hour or so at the new Saatchi Gallery in Chelsea. I say new Saatchi Gallery because the last time I went to the Saatchi Gallery it was a rather excellent space in Boundary Road, between Swiss Cottage and St John’s Wood. In the time since then – at least fifteen years – the gallery has moved twice, and grown greatly.

In the gallery in Boundary Road was one of my favourite artworks: a room full of oil. It smelled awful, but it looked beautiful: completely flat, black and incredibly reflective. You could walk out on a gantry over the oil, and down some steps into the oil – protected by steel walls, but below the surface. Walking into the reflection, the surface of the oil at eye level. It was a remarkable experience.

I was really, really pleased to find out the installation was in the new gallery, too – presumably it moved to County Hall and now into the new space. (I wonder if it is the same oil?) I also now know what it is called – 20:50 – by Richard Wilson.

The Saatchi Gallery is happy to have anyone take photographs of its artworks. So I did…

Of course, I looked at the other work in the gallery as well. There is a large display of art from India at them moment, most of which consists of paintings, and since photographs can’t add anything, I didn’t take any pictures; but I did like these two works by Subodh Gupta.

There were also some sculptures in glass from, I believe, a Mexican artist, Koehi Naura.

I didn’t write down who created this giant piece of sculpture, but I loved the vista through the door.

The Saatchi Gallery is a large space – and even filled with work that didn’t grab me, the space is wonderful. I can see myself going back frequently. If that is what advertising pays for, I think I rather approve.

I have been to two large exhibitions recently. Back in February, I went to the Palladio show at the Royal Academy (which I briefly mentioned back then), and then this week I went to see a big exhibition on Le Corbusier at the Barbican.

I was underwhelmed by the Palladio – it didn’t grab me at all. In contrast, the Le Corbusier was fascinating: even though I prefer Palladian architecture by far, Le Corbusier worked much better as an exhibition.

Intriguingly, I think part of this might be down to the environment: the lighting in the Palladio was kept very dim, to protect centuries old documents. In contrast, the Le Corbusier was bright and accessible. It placed Le Corbusier’s buildings and ideas in context and explained why they were important.

The architectural models used to illustrate Palladian designs felt static and dead, whilst those of Le Corbusier’s buildings seemed vital and energetic (not necessarily a feeling I have of his buildings!) – this may be down to the level of the lighting.

The Barbican recreated some spaces that Le Corbusier had designed, so one could actually experience what it would have been like to inhabit them (in a rather reduced kind of a way) – a very sixties kitchen, for instance.

The Le Corbusier also made a much better use of video than the Palladio. In the exhibition itself, there was little use made of photographs or video in the Palladio: there were some frustratingly small photographs, but the only video I can remember was outside of the main body of the exhibition, with some videos made by living architects on the effect that Palladio’s designs had on them. These were the best bits of the show – the architecture came alive as these architects explored Palladio’s ideas. But they were right at the end, and by then the wish to explore with them had long since gone.

In contrast, the Le Corbusier exhibition made use of a lot of photographs and videos. We saw his designs being built in different parts of the world. We were able to walk through his buildings via videos. (This could have been done with Palladio too – the curators just lacked the means or imagination.) The precious documents included in the show were only seen as slides, which meant the whole thing could be bright, and the details could be seen – if only the Royal Academy had done that!

Both Palladio and Le Corbusier produced designs which were never built. Le Corbusier developed plans for the centre of Paris which would have required knocking down several blocks north of Ile St Louis, replacing the palais and grand buildings with huge tower blocks. I actually gasped when I saw the plans, and then burst into laughter – it seemed so absurd. He also planned a long strip-tower block for (I think) Algiers, a multi-storey block miles long. It looked like a great idea, but an awful actuality – and it reminded me that while Le Corbusier’s idea were interesting, and the buildings he built were fascinating, his influence resulted some of the worst of 20th century social buildings: tall towers, box constructions, anonymous and impersonal urban landscapes – buildings like the infamous Byker Wall, the towers in Glasgow’s Gorbals, the centre of Cumbernauld (a new town that aged prematurely) and throughout Britain.

The ideas might have been interesting, but they were interpreted too strictly, with insufficient investment and fast and shoddy work; they didn’t last – though some, like the Trellick Tower are now highly regarded.

But even here, the Le Corbusier succeeded: they had a section showing these buildings, including emphasising the link between Le Corbusier and the Barbican itself - whilst no mention had been made of the Palladian Royal Academy building, nor any of the Georgian buildings based on his ideas and cherished throughout Britain.

Generally, I’d say I much prefer Palladio’s influence (although Le Corbusier started out as an architect in the classical tradition) – the Georgian splendour of both Bath and Edinburgh, and the beauty of Palladio’s buildings in Venice; but in terms of exhibitions, Le Corbusier won out easily.

The day after the memorial celebration frankie_ecap and I spent wandering around Oxford. She had been staying with white_hart and I met them in Broad Street, being dragged down the road until I saw one of Anthony Gormley’s sculptures balanced precariously on the corner of the roof of Blackwell’s art shop. Although not one of his series Event Horizon, it could have been: a human figure perched on the roof. It is very disturbing – a figure, silhouetted, stock still, almost as if waiting to fall. It is unnerving.

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