LONDON ART BLOG 4: Speaking of the way in which Jock McFayden uses paint to indicate his range of subjects, which (whether landscape, buildings or people) are all facing possible extinction, Rowan Moore (2019: 48) says of the paint once applied: ‘While it passionately wants to be something or make something, its grip on the … More LONDON ART BLOG 4: Speaking of the way in which Jock McFayden uses paint to indicate his range of subjects, Rowan Moore says of the paint once applied: ‘While it passionately wants to be something or make something, its grip on the surface of the canvas is provisional’.  This blog reviews an unexpected look at the short exhibition of Jock McFayden’s work, Tourist without a Guidebook currently at the Royal Academy. 

LONDON ART BLOG 3B: Speaking of the ‘Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear’ (1889) Louis van Tilborgh says that, in the book accompanying this exhibition: ‘although our attention is drawn to Van Gogh’s bandaged face, the style is so dominant and so radiant that the depiction of his features seems to recede into the background’.  Tilborgh goes … More LONDON ART BLOG 3B: Speaking of the ‘Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear’, Louis van Tilborgh says that: ‘the style is so dominant and so radiant that the depiction of his features seems to recede into the background’.  Tilborgh goes on to say that the artist thus achieved his goal that: ‘painting would become “more music and less sculpture”’. Self-portrayal and art focused on the exhibition accompanying Karen Serres (Ed.) ‘Van Gogh: Self-Portraits’. 

LONDON ART BLOG 3A: Art and me: how the Courtauld Institute and Gallery played a part in the silent development of a half-conscious love of the images and painting that make up a cultural tradition about which I remain ambivalent. This is the first part of a blog based on visiting the Courtauld Gallery on … More LONDON ART BLOG 3A: Art and me. This is the first part of a blog based on visiting the Courtauld Gallery on the 8th February 2022, ostensibly to see only the Van Gogh: Self-Portraits exhibition (see LONDON ART BLOG 3B on this). 

LONDON ART BLOG 2: In her brief summary contribution to the 2021 book accompanying  the Royal Academy’s delayed exhibition Francis Bacon: Man and Beast, Catherine Lampert says, as if in summary of Bacon’s attitude to the artistic image: ‘Watch me go into a territory that others do not dare represent’.[1] This blog is about the … More LONDON ART BLOG 2: Catherine Lampert says, as if in summary of Bacon’s attitude to the artistic image: ‘Watch me go into a territory that others do not dare represent’. This blog is about the meaning, effects and affects of the imagery of dualistic terror, agony and pain considered in the Royal Academy exhibition ‘Francis Bacon: Man and Beast’ based on a visit to it on the 8th February 2022.

LONDON ART BLOG 1: Susan Foister & Peter Van Brink say of the exhibition at the National Gallery, Dürer’s Journeys: Travels of a Renaissance Artist in the publication that covers that exhibition: ‘Many new discoveries have been made in the preparation of this exhibition and the accompanying publication’.[1] It is a small claim and Kathryn Murphy reviewing the … More LONDON ART BLOG 1: Kathryn Murphy reviewing The National Gallery, ‘Dürer’s Journeys: Travels of a Renaissance Artist’ exhibition for the magazine ‘Apollo’ says the: ‘exhibition with its rather perfunctory captions, would have benefitted from … glimpses of a stranger, more curious Dürer, restless, wandering, moving at speed’. This blog reflects on the possible pitfalls of art exhibitions in the great international art institutions based on single great ‘old masters’. It is based on a visit to it on the 9th February 2022 and the accompanying book. 

‘Can and should we queer the past? Or is history – with all its ambiguity, misleading familiarity and unknowable possibility – already queer’.[1]  So says Justin Bengry in a 2021 essay from a set examining the ‘theory’ of history. A consideration of the differences in telling ‘untold’ historical stories in two books: Paul Baker & … More ‘Can and should we queer the past? Or is history – with all its ambiguity, misleading familiarity and unknowable possibility – already queer’. So says Justin Bengry in a 2021 essay from a set examining the ‘theory’ of history. A consideration of the differences in telling ‘untold’ historical stories in two books: Paul Baker & Jo Stanley’s ‘Hello Sailor!: The Hidden History of Gay Life at Sea’, & Stephen Bourne ‘Fighting Proud: The Untold story of The Gay Men who served in Two World Wars’.

“Being a star in our own Twitterverse, sometimes resplendent, but more often fading (however continual our hard tapping may be), is all that may be left of the desire to belong to something that is more substantial and larger than our self”. A blog based on Leopoldstadt, the new play by Tom Stoppard seen 27/01/2022 … More “Being a star in our own Twitterverse, sometimes resplendent, but more often fading (however continual our hard tapping may be), is all that may be left of the desire to belong to something that is more substantial and larger than our self”. A blog based on ‘Leopoldstadt’, the new play by Tom Stoppard seen 27/01/2022 live-streamed to many venues.

‘.. a streak of normality and even banality, which assumes its own surreal tone.  Love letters to the past are always addressed to an illusion, yet this is a seductive piece of myth-making.’ (Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian 21 January 2022). ‘If Belfast had been rolled round in the dirt and broken glass, it might have … More Even if we accept that art owes a debt to truth, what kind of truths must it tell and / or show in order to be great art? Steve reflects on this in the case of cinema films that wear their search for excellence of a kind on their sleeves.  The reflection happens around a case study of Kenneth Branagh’s ‘Belfast’ (based on seeing it for the first time on 21st January 2022 at the Odeon, Durham and two reviews). 

‘… stories are at the heart of it … the stories we tell to create ourselves… the stories we tell to create others. … And, of course, the stories we tell to fall in love’.[1] This is a blog reflecting on the role of story-telling in queer fiction and why a ‘story about crocodiles’ might … More ‘… stories are at the heart of it … the stories we tell to create ourselves… the stories we tell to create others. … And, of course, the stories we tell to fall in love’. This is a blog reflecting on the role of story-telling in queer fiction and why a ‘story about crocodiles’ might be an appropriate vehicle for such reflections. It is based on Philip Ridley’s 2021 revision of his novel ‘Crocodilia’ (first published in 1988)

Reflecting on an exhibition I had not expected to enjoy so much. It was at York Art Gallery, entitled Young Gainsborough: Rediscovered Landscape Drawings (based on a visit to it on the 15th January 2022).  Visiting any city as Omicron sweeps over us with our ignorance of it as deep as that of a directionless … More Reflecting on an exhibition I had not expected to enjoy so much. It was at York Art Gallery, entitled Young Gainsborough: Rediscovered Landscape Drawings (based on a visit to it on the 15th January 2022). 

This blog is based on my own belief that the writing of a queer ‘life’ (whether as biography or autobiography) is fraught with difficulties that are sometimes also experienced in living such lives. I test it by examining R. Tripp Evan’s 2010 book, Grant Wood: a Life New York, Alfred A. Knopf. ‘A Life’ is … More This blog is based on my own belief that the writing of a queer ‘life’ (whether as biography or autobiography) is fraught with difficulties that are sometimes also experienced in living such lives. I test it by examining R. Tripp Evan’s 2010 book, ‘Grant Wood: a Life’.