Tag: painting

Let’s pretend we can get in the mind (or guts) of great artists, and consider how Anish Kapoor might translate the question, ‘What’s a time you followed your gut and it turned out to be exactly right?’ This is a blog preparing to see his new exhibition at the Hayward Gallery.

June 24, 2026

Let’s pretend we can get in the mind of great artists, and consider how Anish Kapoor might translate the question, ‘What’s a time you followed your gut and it turned out to be exactly right?’ This is a blog preparing to see his new exhibition at the Hayward Gallery. Following your gut to their source: … More Let’s pretend we can get in the mind (or guts) of great artists, and consider how Anish Kapoor might translate the question, ‘What’s a time you followed your gut and it turned out to be exactly right?’ This is a blog preparing to see his new exhibition at the Hayward Gallery.

When the subject is ‘seeing’, why exclude visual art, for that too allows us to ‘see’ in more than ways that are entirely visual. This blog is an explanation of why I go to art exhibitions. This is almost the same as explaining why I feel a need to prepare myself to see them. The pleasures and perils of researched prescience is however a subject in itself. This blog anticipates seeing the new ‘Zurbarán’ Exhibition at 12.00 midday to 13.30 (about) on Thursday 9th July. Will it change my world?

June 17, 2026

Explaining why I go to art exhibitions is almost the same as explaining why I feel a need to prepare myself to see them. The pleasures and perils of researched prescience is however a subject in itself. This blog anticipates seeing the new Zurbarán ExWhen the subject is ‘seeing’, why exclude visual art, for that … More When the subject is ‘seeing’, why exclude visual art, for that too allows us to ‘see’ in more than ways that are entirely visual. This blog is an explanation of why I go to art exhibitions. This is almost the same as explaining why I feel a need to prepare myself to see them. The pleasures and perils of researched prescience is however a subject in itself. This blog anticipates seeing the new ‘Zurbarán’ Exhibition at 12.00 midday to 13.30 (about) on Thursday 9th July. Will it change my world?

There is no need for magical thinking in order to find art ‘that you wish you could experience again for the first time’. Visit art enough and it must reinvent itself. This is a blog on preparing to visit London again for an art-binge-fest

June 11, 2026

It is time for another looking forward period and for some events preparing myself – where appropriate material exists for doing so (a play-script or catalogue already purchase). In those latter cases, I will blog in preparation, Here to announce my schedule (with Geoffee and Baz left behind for one night at home), under this … More There is no need for magical thinking in order to find art ‘that you wish you could experience again for the first time’. Visit art enough and it must reinvent itself. This is a blog on preparing to visit London again for an art-binge-fest

Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’.

November 22, 2025

Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’. There is some contention about whether the only personality who is allowed to be seen in ‘red and green’ is a ‘fairy queen’ or an ‘Irish queen’. Unfortunately … More Wear colours as if they were things and contained emotion as well as expressing it, or, ‘if I were a fairy queen, I’d wear red and green’.

This blog documents reflection on a visit, and reading afterwards about, ‘Gilbert & George: 21st Century Pictures’ in the London South Bank, The Hayward Gallery on 22nd October 2025 at 10.30 a.m.

November 2, 2025

What might Gilbert & George mean when they said in 1986 in What Our Art Means (and republished by them in the catalogue of this exhibition in 2025) that it is intended ‘to speak across the barriers of knowledge directly to People about their Life, and not about their knowledge of art’.[1] This blog documents … More This blog documents reflection on a visit, and reading afterwards about, ‘Gilbert & George: 21st Century Pictures’ in the London South Bank, The Hayward Gallery on 22nd October 2025 at 10.30 a.m.

October 21st 2025: The first day of my birthday treats ends earlier than planned: Mea Culpa!

October 25, 2025

October 21st 2025: The first day of my birthday treats ends earlier than planned: Mea Culpa! I started this blog on the 21st October and its now the 24th and so backlogged with diary like blog reports. However, it helps to organise my brain to do them. On the 21st, I wrote this after an … More October 21st 2025: The first day of my birthday treats ends earlier than planned: Mea Culpa!

The appreciation of art is not a matter of ‘personal choice’ or ‘favour’; it is a duty. This is so not only for its maker but its reading, for reading is, in part, co-making.

October 2, 2025

The appreciation of art is not a matter of ‘personal choice’ or ‘favour’; it is a duty. This is so not only for its maker but its reading, for reading is, in part, co-making. Duty, of course, does not exclude personal pleasure if it does exclude banal ideas of choice between pleasures. The quotation and … More The appreciation of art is not a matter of ‘personal choice’ or ‘favour’; it is a duty. This is so not only for its maker but its reading, for reading is, in part, co-making.

What could I do more of? I could allow art and ways of seeing it to challenge me more: a preview of what I expect from the ‘Theatre Picasso’ exhibition at Tate modern, which I see on October 21st 2025.

September 23, 2025

What could I do more of? I could allow art and ways of seeing it to challenge me more: a preview of what I expect from the ‘Theatre Picasso’ exhibition at Tate modern, which I see on October 21st 2025. There is nearly always a debate these days – though perhaps there always was before … More What could I do more of? I could allow art and ways of seeing it to challenge me more: a preview of what I expect from the ‘Theatre Picasso’ exhibition at Tate modern, which I see on October 21st 2025.

It was Jenny Saville’s new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London, ‘The Anatomy of Painting’.

August 22, 2025

In an interview with Sarah Howgate in the catalogue of the 2025 exhibition The Anatomy of Painting, Jenny Saville says that some part of her decisions and choices of method and technique as a painter is about freeing ‘up time to think about the way I’m applying paint – the mark-making, paint consistency and colour. … More It was Jenny Saville’s new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London, ‘The Anatomy of Painting’.

Look not for ‘beauty’ but ‘precarity, structural fragmentation or decay, fragility  and ephemerality’. This blog is based on a visit to the National Galleries of Scotland’s exhibition ‘Andy Goldsworthy: Fifty Years’ on the 11th August 2025.

August 13, 2025

It is almost compulsory to describe the effect of art as achieved ‘beauty’. We use ‘beauty’ too often in this respect. The words that come to me as I reflect on an attempt to reconnect with the art of Andy Goldsworthy are precarity, structural fragmentation or decay, fragility  and ephemerality, so how has his lasted … More Look not for ‘beauty’ but ‘precarity, structural fragmentation or decay, fragility  and ephemerality’. This blog is based on a visit to the National Galleries of Scotland’s exhibition ‘Andy Goldsworthy: Fifty Years’ on the 11th August 2025.

Today was a typical day: a gust of wind sort of upset everything.

July 20, 2025

Félix Vallotton Le Coup de Vent 1894 A coup in French is literally a ‘blow’ or ‘gust’ but, of course, we know it best in the term ‘Le Coup d’État‘, such as that event on 18 Brumaire where Napoleon took control of French revolutionary forces and thus the state. it has been forever after the … More Today was a typical day: a gust of wind sort of upset everything.