Thursday, September 27, 2012
Baa-Lambs reprised
Despite having had a rather busy morning, we decided, nevertheless to use our tickets for the Pre-Raphaelites at the Brit Tate yesterday afternoon. It was also an opportunity to replenish smoked bacon stocks from the Madeira Café (see http://madeiralondon.co.uk/) at Vauxhall.
Perhaps because they realized that I was not the only one was slightly annoyed at having to pay to see a lot of pictures which one used to be able to see for free, the curators of this exhibition had pulled in a lot of other pictures from up north and elsewhere. Lots of good stuff, nicely hung, but for me Holman Hunt was the man of the day, the oddly masculine faces of some of his ladies and the light of the world notwithstanding. But it is interesting that workers would queue up to pay a shilling a go to see this last, which must have meant more than than the fact that retail prices have gone up by a factor of around 25 since then would suggest (see Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, May 1994). I was particularly taken with his hireling shepherd, only slightly marred by the drone of the conductress of some school party. Good to see the scapegoat again, brought down from Liverpool for the exhibition.
A couple of the famous pictures, awakening conscience and marianna seemed very small and dark in this company: was this because they had not been cleaned? Because of some vagary of the technique or paint used?
I also found two famous paintings by Ford, the baa-lambs and the last of England, both much better in the flesh than they were in reproduction - although I was still not that keen on them. This was also true of most of the reproductions in the souvenir book (very reasonably priced at £19.99), with the reproductions looking very pale, at least so long as the real thing was fresh in the mind's eye. I wonder if it is possible for reproduction to get any better? Or have we long reached the limit of what can be done with a printing press on paper?
All in all a good exhibition, crowded but not crowded out, despite the bad gallery manners of some of our foreign guests. I will be back.
It is also seems that Brit Tate is remodeling the main entrance and the big pillared gallery which the entrance leads into. Both of which I liked the way they were - despite the recent tendency to hang lumps of scrap metal from the ceiling - and so it remains to be seen whether the change - presumably expensive - will be an improvement.
Today was the day to call call centers. The prize for the most irritating hold music went to Liverpool Victoria of Bournemouth, with Aviva of Norwich second by five lengths. Special prize to Alliance & Leicester for bureaucracy run wild.
Perhaps because they realized that I was not the only one was slightly annoyed at having to pay to see a lot of pictures which one used to be able to see for free, the curators of this exhibition had pulled in a lot of other pictures from up north and elsewhere. Lots of good stuff, nicely hung, but for me Holman Hunt was the man of the day, the oddly masculine faces of some of his ladies and the light of the world notwithstanding. But it is interesting that workers would queue up to pay a shilling a go to see this last, which must have meant more than than the fact that retail prices have gone up by a factor of around 25 since then would suggest (see Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, May 1994). I was particularly taken with his hireling shepherd, only slightly marred by the drone of the conductress of some school party. Good to see the scapegoat again, brought down from Liverpool for the exhibition.
A couple of the famous pictures, awakening conscience and marianna seemed very small and dark in this company: was this because they had not been cleaned? Because of some vagary of the technique or paint used?
I also found two famous paintings by Ford, the baa-lambs and the last of England, both much better in the flesh than they were in reproduction - although I was still not that keen on them. This was also true of most of the reproductions in the souvenir book (very reasonably priced at £19.99), with the reproductions looking very pale, at least so long as the real thing was fresh in the mind's eye. I wonder if it is possible for reproduction to get any better? Or have we long reached the limit of what can be done with a printing press on paper?
All in all a good exhibition, crowded but not crowded out, despite the bad gallery manners of some of our foreign guests. I will be back.
It is also seems that Brit Tate is remodeling the main entrance and the big pillared gallery which the entrance leads into. Both of which I liked the way they were - despite the recent tendency to hang lumps of scrap metal from the ceiling - and so it remains to be seen whether the change - presumably expensive - will be an improvement.
Today was the day to call call centers. The prize for the most irritating hold music went to Liverpool Victoria of Bournemouth, with Aviva of Norwich second by five lengths. Special prize to Alliance & Leicester for bureaucracy run wild.
# posted by Jim @ 11:20 AM 
