On seeing the National Gallery Freud retrospective exhibition ‘in the flesh’ on the 30th November 2022. An addendum to the blog done ‘prior to visiting the exhibition’. Link to original blog (from October 5th) just above opening paragraph of this new one. The original blog is available at: https://stevebamlett.home.blog/2022/10/05/the-credit-suisse-exhibition-lucian-freud-new-perspectives-is-according-to-laura-cumming-the-artist-stripped-bare-freuds-portraits-can-speak-for-themselves-this-blog/ The Credit Suisse Exhibition 2022 on … More On seeing the National Gallery Freud retrospective exhibition ‘in the flesh’ on the 30th November 2022. An addendum to the blog done ‘prior to visiting the exhibition’. Link to original blog (from October 5th) just above opening paragraph of this new one.

‘Transgression and deviance are no longer universal but local, temporary and up for debate. / … / The bawdy human, indulging in an excess of all these biological functions, addresses the threshold between how things are and how they could be if only we could get over the hang ups and let downs of daily … More ‘Transgression and deviance are no longer universal but local, temporary and up for debate. / … / The bawdy human, indulging in an excess of all these biological functions, addresses the threshold between how things are and how they could be if only we could get over the hang ups and let downs of daily life’. This is a blog exploring, from my own point of view, the limits of using the biological or ‘animal’ functions, especially in relation to sex, as an argument for liberation of the oppressed and marginalised, however much fun that approach yields. It uses the book / catalogue of a Tate Britain exhibition in 2010: Tim, Batchelor, Cedar Lewisohn & Marin Myrone (eds) [2010] ‘Rude Britannia: British Comic Art’.

This is a blog about the art of Luigi Lucioni, which some whim persuaded me to entitle: ‘The Stilled Lives of the Closet as an approach to the art of Luigi Lucioni (1900 – 1988)’. It uses the book / catalogue of an exhibition: Katie Wood Kirchoff [Ed.] (2022) Luigi Lucioni: Modern Light for Shelburne … More This is a blog about the art of Luigi Lucioni, which some whim persuaded me to entitle: ‘The Stilled Lives of the Closet as an approach to the art of Luigi Lucioni (1900 – 1988)’. It uses the book / catalogue of an exhibition: Katie Wood Kirchoff [Ed.] (2022) ‘Luigi Lucioni: Modern Light’.

‘So, I’m here with my mum to ask a few questions about life’.[1] ‘… – yes, she will continue to fashion herself to help give her bodam * grace – the obstacle of items will slow down this impedance’s pace’. [2] This blog examines how and why we need stories wherein everyone, even the story, … More ‘So, I’m here with my mum to ask a few questions about life’. ‘… – yes, she will continue to fashion herself to help give her bodam * grace – the obstacle of items will slow down this impedance’s pace’. This blog examines how and why we need stories wherein everyone, even the story has ‘lost the plot’! It concerns Derek Owusu (2022) Losing The Plot London, Edinburgh, Canongate.

“I have a Ganymede brought from Florence that Mr. Hilliard, the painter, has much commended. It has a rare beauty. The boy is looking up at the eagle without a trace of fright; you would say he was some child, innocently watching a falcon”.[1] This blog looks at the theme of surrender to superior power, … More “I have a Ganymede brought from Florence that Mr. Hilliard, the painter, has much commended. It has a rare beauty. The boy is looking up at the eagle without a trace of fright; you would say he was some child, innocently watching a falcon”.[1] This blog looks at the theme of surrender to superior power, service, sexuality, play and gender in Bryher’s 1957 novel, ‘The Player’s Boy’.

Colm Tóibín’s latest collected essays suggest that, at least in some way (perhaps in the way we call ‘denial’) his writing is an example of how Irish art and discourse is always, in the end, about ‘being Irish and Catholic’. But if so, I would argue, it is an Irish and Catholic identity queered into … More Colm Tóibín’s latest collected essays suggest that, at least in some way (perhaps in the way we call ‘denial’) his writing is an example of how Irish art and discourse is always, in the end, about ‘being Irish and Catholic’. But if so, I would argue, it is an Irish and Catholic identity queered .  This is a blog on the essays of Colm Tóibín in his 2022 collection of them, mainly from The London Review of Books: that is, Colm Tóibín (2022) ‘A Guest at the Feast’.

In reporting her dream, Hilda Doolittle (known as H.D.) to her friend and lover Bryher, H.D.: ‘It appears I am that all-but extinct phenomena [sic.], the perfect bi’.[1] This blog is based on reading Susan McCabe’s ‘bi-biography’ H.D. & Bryher: An Untold Love Story of Modernism (2021) New York, Oxford University Press. My copy of … More In reporting her dream, Hilda Doolittle (known as H.D.) to her friend and lover Bryher, says: ‘It appears I am that all-but extinct phenomena [sic.], the perfect bi’.[1] This blog is based on reading Susan McCabe’s ‘bi-biography’ ‘H.D. & Bryher: An Untold Love Story of Modernism’ (2021).

‘The new nudes ask awkward questions and behave provocatively’.[1] This blog is an act of admiration for Frances Borzello’s The Naked Nude (2012, revised 2020) London, Thames & Hudson. Frances Borzello is an art historian and I am usually, quite frankly, antagonistic to the frameworks that define that term as an academic discipline, but sometimes … More ‘The new nudes ask awkward questions and behave provocatively’.[1] This blog is an act of admiration for Frances Borzello’s ‘The Naked Nude’ (2012, revised 2020)

What do Prince and Dickens have in common? A blog on why Nick Hornby is right to look for the answer to why we cling to the notion of individual genius in remarkable comparisons between different artists. A blog on Nick Hornby (2022) ‘Dickens & Prince: A Particular Kind of Genius’, Penguin Random House UK. … More What do Prince and Dickens have in common? A blog on why Nick Hornby is right to look for the answer to why we cling to the notion of individual genius in remarkable comparisons between different artists. A blog on Nick Hornby (2022) ‘Dickens & Prince: A Particular Kind of Genius’. A blog for Prince’s princely fan @JustinCurley4

True stories about strange lives: comparing views about truth-telling and ‘explanations for female genius’, from some of the film critics of Frances O’Connor’s Emily. I saw this film on Sunday 16th October of the Odeon in Durham. In The Sunday Times, Tom Shone takes a severe view of the duty of a film that looks … More True stories about strange lives: comparing views about truth-telling and ‘explanations for female genius’, from some of the film critics of Frances O’Connor’s ‘Emily’. I saw this film on Sunday 16th October of the Odeon in Durham.

‘The biggest task of the show is the actress playing Nora’s (sic.). … A more selfish actress would make the whole play about herself, but not Hannah [Ellis Ryan]. For her it’s very much an ensemble. Michael Meyer, the translator, always used to say that actors who want to grandstand, who aren’t willing to play … More ‘The biggest task of the show is the actress playing Nora’s (sic.). … A more selfish actress would make the whole play about herself, but not Hannah [Ellis Ryan]. For her it’s very much an ensemble. Michael Meyer, the translator, always used to say that actors who want to grandstand, who aren’t willing to play relationships, always fail with Ibsen, because what fascinated him was the complexity of relationships’. This blog discusses the production of Henrik Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ (Michael Meyer translation) by Elysium Theatre Company played on 14th October at Bishop Auckland Town Hall. References to text (not in all precise respects like the production adapted one) from Henrik Ibsen (translated Michael Meyer) [1990: 23 – 104] ‘Plays: Two’.

‘The time has come to be reflective’.[1] Do artists who have lived a very long and full life prefer to experience ‘emotion recollected in tranquillity’ (to which Wordsworth traced the origin of poems) now it can no longer be keenly experienced in action? It would be easy to attribute an actor and novelist’s turn to … More ‘The time has come to be reflective’. Do artists who have lived a very long and full life prefer to experience ‘emotion recollected in tranquillity’ (to which Wordsworth traced the origin of poems) now it can no longer be keenly experienced in action? These poems queer our conception of the development we call normative aging, developing that space in an old queer man’s body wherein we still feel ‘inclined to the wild unreason / that’s unbecoming in a man my age / and seeming dignity’. This blog, with personal reflections of my own, discusses the significance of the poems of Paul Bailey, mainly in ‘Joie de Vivre’ (2022).