Tuesday, October 31, 2006

More art than you can poke a stick at. Not that you should poke sticks at art, as it wouldn't be safe.

A sunny day dawned Friday, and after changing hotels, I set off, with the fairly unclever thought 'well that doesn't look too far' to walk to the Musee Quai Branly. Along the way I got distracted by the Musee du Luxembourg, where a Titian exhibition was on, probably should have considered the poster a little more, with regard to the fact that it was Titian's portraits being exhibited, and perhaps reflected along the lines 'I find portraiture fairly dull, except for Howard Arkley's portrait of Nick Cave, and it would seem unlikely that that is going to be in an exhibition of Titian's portraits for the obvious reason that it was painted by Arkley, not Titian'. But anyway, I went and saw it, along with approximately 14000 French people. So it was both crowded, and fairly uninteresting. There were a couple of jawdroppingly good paintings in there though, so the effort was worthwhile. But it was so crowded I didn't even look in the gift shop. THAT is crowded.

Then I went and had lunch. Potato avec quatre fromages. Happiness was mine.

Then I continued my trek. Note that my cheerful plan to just wander along to the gallery has thus far included another exhibition and a break for a main meal. I was entertained to see a whole bunch of kids apparently running their cross country in the Jardin du Luxembourg; a bit different from Asquith oval that. It must have been the day for small children to be running about Paris because when I got to the Seine there was another bunch of them, running in circles around a lawn, and I got to see the deeply amusing site of a manicured french dog trying to bond with the small children by chasing them, with its equally manicured owner chasing it, shouting at it in an increasingly irate fashion. Ah, entertainment. I'm also happy to report that by the end of the week in Paris I was able to stop thinking to myself, every time I saw french children 'You're so smart! You can speak FRENCH! At your age!'

I finally made it to Quai Branly, which is the latest large museum to open in Paris. Some of you will have seen it in the papers a few months ago when it opened - it is dedicated to displaying collections of 'non-western' art, from former ethnographic collections that were gathered by missionaries, anthropologists, artists etc. So it is a very strange project, as it links together an incredible range of material, largely along the lines of 'stuff that was formerly considered too primitive to be art, or to be exhibited along with 'real' art' - but obviously the effect of exhibiting it all together, apart from western art, leaves a real danger of reinforcing that view. This is addressed in some text panels, along with the museum's purpose of trying to further understanding amongst the world's peoples etc. So it really started to piss me off that the vast range of text labels and wall panels were only in French. Some larger panels that introduced whole sections were in English (and I think Spanish) as well, but the pieces for each object were only in French, which I think really hampers achieving their purpose. In art galleries and most other places it didn't bother me that things were only in French, it's fair enough, what with it being France and all, but considering their intention of being an international collection, and that there is not only one way to understand and interpret the objects on display, it really made it impossible to understand a lot of the exhibits. My other gripe was the bizarre display of Australian indigenous art, where everything was under low lighting - necessary for the bark paintings for conservation, but for contemporary paintings of acrylic on canvas it created this weird aura of faux-antiquity. Of course this could have been explained in the text panels but I wouldn't know. The museum looks better from the outside than the inside I think - all pointy angles and native grasses in a style reminiscent of the National Museum of Australia - inside there is a ramp which takes you from the entrance up to the actual exhibit, which goes for about half a kilometre, and for no obvious purpose. There are a few quotes projected onto the wall, and a couple of different angles where you get to view things from unusual perspectives, but no achievable aim was met. One very cool part of it is that they have a huge collection of African traditional instruments, which can't all be displayed at once, but they have stored them in a huge circular atrium with glass walls, so you can see some of them even while they are in storage. Once you eventually emerge at the top of the enormous white ramp you enter the dimply lit space of the actual gallery, which is fairly odd, featuring as it does five foot walls covered in what appears to be ochre coloured 'leather' - seems to be attempting to create a faux-cave feel, with odd overtones of 'getting back to nature'. The Aboriginal art that is included in the building, to much joy and fanfare by the Australian press, is largely on the ceilings of the gift shop and the office space, so it can be seen from the outside of the gallery, and it does look very good, but mostly as an interior design technique rather than as a particular leap forward in recognition for aboriginal art on the world stage. The actual collection is amazing, incredible pieces from all over the world, from Australia to Native America. But a very mixed experience!

After that I went and had a coke and some frites and was charged 11 euro for the privilege. Note to self: read menus carefully when near the Eiffel Tower!

Then, I decided on more walking - I went to the Arc de Triomphe, sat and marvelled at the crazy driving - six lanes of traffic all following where their hearts lead them - then went for a wander down Les Champs Elysees. I bought a new cardy. Because I am a Nanna.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Paris continued

When I left the Musee D'Orsay I went for a wander through the Latin Quarter, and reflected on how for years - YEARS - I had assumed the 'Latin' in Latin Quarter was in the South American, Latino, sense, and not the Latin-speaking scholar sense, and on how that makes very little historical sense at all. Really glad I didn't incorporate that into any essays. Visited 'Shakespeare & Co', the legendary English-language bookshop on the banks of the Seine, which, were there to be supplies of bread to nibble on, I could happily have never left. Most of the upstairs level is lined floor-to-ceiling with books that aren't for sale, but that you are 'welcome to refer to' and it has lots of odd corners to sit in and read. Downstairs it is a mix of new and second-hand books, and In English! So very exciting! Paris is full of fabulous-looking bookshops that I kept going to bound into to explore, and then with a sudden slump of the shoulders, would recollect that the vast majority of its contents would be unintelligible to me.
Tearing myself away from my new papery friends, I crossed over to the middle of the Seine and had a wander around Notre Dame - beautiful, lovely glass, not much more to be said.
I headed off to find the nice-looking restaurant I had seen earlier, which of course I didn't, instead, I ambled in extravagantly incorrect directions for a really quite vast amount of time. I stumbled upon the College de France, and the Place de Michel Foucault, and as much as it would have been tempting to sit round questioning the power appropriated through naming such places and so on, plummeting blood sugars drove me on... and into an unfortunately bad chinese restaurant. Such a waste of what otherwise would have been excellent mushrooms.
The next day (that's right! we're only up to Wednesday!) I headed of to the Pompidou Centre. Aaaah. Happy days!
They are currently holding an exhibition of Rauschenberg's combines - Charlene, I saw Charlene!!! The tragedy of this exhibition was only being able to see it once. Having read about Rauschenberg and seen so much of this work in reproduction I was ecstatic to finally see it, and see so much of it. The exhibition was organised chronologically, showing the development of R's use of collage between (I think) 1954-1968. Excellent!
The rest of the Pompidou took most of the remainder of the day - swathes of 20th century art - I go to my happy place just thinking about it...
I headed back to the hostel via la fromagerie, la boulangerie et du vin rouge - c'etait tres bien.
Thursday: Musee du Picasso - I heard mixed reports about this, so my expectations weren't unduly inflated, and so I was most pleasantly elevated by my experience there. I could see how the collection itself could be disappointing if your expectation was that it would contain the most famous works, but I really liked the very early pieces that they have, and a lot of the drawings and his first collages, showing how Picasso constantly changed as an artist. Especially the collages, because they are fascinating to me. And some of the drawings were utterly brilliant. I really do resent him for being so damn good at everything. Freak.
Then I travelled to the other side of the town to the Dubuffet Fondation, via lunch, rain, and a most elaborate detour - I really do create some interesting voyages, based on only wanting to take one metro line between two places. It isn't very sane, but you do get to see quite a bit of Paris ('Nous tu detestons' say J & T (their french isn't very good I'm afraid)). The Fondation is located in Dubuffet's old house, and has a decent number of works from about the mid-70s into the 80s, which were good to see, but as I am mostly interested in his work from the 40s and 50s, not absolutely mindblowing. But for that I would have to travel to Switzerland. After that I performed more circuitous wandering, and found the Eiffel Tower, always makes it easier when what you are looking for is a large pointy landmark. Had a wander around it, got snappy with the lenses, considered climbing up, but based on it being cold at ground level, and me already being tired and misanthropic, I decided to sit down and have an icecream and do the crossword instead. And ponder how I am perhaps a little too in touch with my inner-nanna.

Friday, October 20, 2006

Life sans Tip Top

So I arrived in Paris on Monday afternoon, checked into my hostel and took a walk around Montmartre - soon realising that Amelie is not as exaggerated a portrait of Paris as I always thought - wandered up to Sacre Couer, atop the entertainingly named La Butte de Montmartre, not, as I had thought a poetique way of referring to the arse-end of town, rather used in a strictly geographique sense - one that results in the thought 'hey, turns out my thighs have muscles after all' - continued my pattern of visiting churches right on evensong time, first time I've seen such operatic nuns. Other than, you know, The Sound of Music.

Stunning view from the top of the Butte [snigger] and then off to find dinner, basically found a brasserie the same as the one in Amelie, and full of a clientele that closely ressembled the cast. Everytime I looked up a different french freak man would be staring at me. Kept expecting them to be whipping out a tape recorder and making a verbal note about their thoughts vis a vis me and the woman behind the tabac counter. French people don't seem to have any qualms about openly staring. Either that, or I am just way more freakish than I ever thought. Admittedly matters sartorial and my coiffure aren't at their best, but...

The first night at the hostel did not bode well - walls the colour of earwax, a bed that swayed like a raft in a storm (damn bunk beds! damn them! no one, NO ONE over the age of 15 should have to sleep in a bunk bed!) and walls paper thin and a party downstairs... this did not bode well for the sleep of peace... the party finally stopped and the snores began. Emanating from the bunk below me, I pondered 'are they snoring, or is that a dying bull?'. At this point the Bunk of Sways became quite useful, as whenever I tossed, the bunk swayed, and the bull ceased moaning.

Thankfully, the hostel has since improved, and proved itself to be an advantage - being an English-speaking zone it is a bit of a relief after flogging my non-french to death all day to come back somewhere that I can speak anglais and not cause offence. Very strange to be in a non-english speaking country at long last, not to have that information that you pick up peripherally throughout the day - street signs, newspaper headlines, overheard conversations, snippets of radio etc - that give you a background sense of what is going on. And not being able to buy a newspaper reliably is a strange torture for someone possessed of an addiction where matters of the daily press are concerned. Anyway, having acclimatised to the hostel I'll be moving tomorrow - an unfortunate result of my disorganisation. Here's a tip, gratis, from me to you: If you are coming to Paris, how's about booking your accommodation more than three days in advance. Just a thought.

In other matters of joy: bread, cheese and wine. All cheaper, all better than their equivalents en australie. J'adore les vins francais. Currently before me, as may not be a surprise to you, considering the rambling form of this post, is a rather fine botteille of le vin rouge that set me back all of 2.90 euro (less than six australienne). Oh happy day! Happy Day! I have something of a temptation to feed a french person tip top just to find out how they would process the thought that this is something that is a. sold as bread, and b. voluntarily consumed. Anyway, I'll now have to devote my remaining days of bread nibbling between Eire and France. Not such a bad fate.

So, beyond matters of bedding and of consumables - I started off my tuesday by participating in a near revolution. It seems that every guide book ever is incorrect in publishing the opening time of the Musee d'Orsay as 9am, when it is 9.30. Not a big deal. I wandered, and then joined the cue that had formed at about 9.20, to join the mutual sigh of disappointment at the notice that the musuem was that day not opening until 10am. When 10am came and went, and the queue numbered at least three hundred (not including pre-sold tickets, and group bookings - there must have been at least 600 people waiting)people started going up and asking what was going on. And brace yourself. The entire Orsay was shut down because of a board meeting. I ask you. Is there any other museum in the entire world that would shut down and then run over because of a board meeting? Anyway, tempers were fizzing as minutes ticked by, some synchronised clapping started, there was grumpiness aplenty, I was starting to think 'hey one of the reasons paris was redesigned in the nineteenth century was revolutions, would be kind of cool to participate in one my first morning here' - and then they opened the doors. So pretty much a non-story really.

Anyway, I then spent four or five hours of joy. Cezanne almost made me cry. I haughtily dismissed Renoir once more, and struggled with the urge to yell at people in the Renoir salles - WHAT are you doing, you fools, this is terrible, go back to Cezanne and then tell me that Renoir is worth your time?! Then remembered vague thoughts about subjective taste blah blah. eh.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Gettin' some craic

Everything you have heard about Irish hospitality is true (as long as everything you have heard is good). I arrived in Dublin last Thursday; where I was to stay with family friends that I had never met before - I was blown away by their generosity in providing me with places to stay; giving me guided tours; feeding me & ensuring I got to and from the airport - it made for such an excellent trip to Ireland and was so much better than the impression you end up with of places that you visit alone.

I started my visit with a guided walking tour of Dublin, which is different to what I expected, which on reflection was Oxford only with more Guinness and shamrocks. As it was built in more Renaissance/neo-classical, rather than gothic/neo-gothic, it was somewhat different. Having an Irish tour guide made the history more alive - hearing about what family members did in the fighting in 1916, rather trying to resurrect my dim memories of 'Michael Collins' [the film - I have a clearer memory of our friend in Indonesia]. It was fascinating seeing and hearing about all the changes to Ireland, and Dublin especially, since joining the EU - house prices have certainly gone insane; with three bedroom houses in Dublin suburbs at something like a million Aus dollars.

You can walk through most of central Dublin in about three hours; and in this time you will see approximately 4000 pubs. The food there is excellent; lots of great seafood! And the bread! It is so tasty it makes you want to sit in a bakery and nibble bread until you die.

Now, as it was this that made me first incline to include Dublin in this trip, unsurprisingly I headed off to the National Library of Ireland for the Yeats exhibition the following day. The NLI has a huge collection of Yeats' papers, manuscripts, old passports and the like, and so sensibly decided that they should get them on display, and have put together an excelleent exhibition. When you first enter it has audio of poems being read out while the lyrics and related images are projected onto the walls - oddly the reading I liked least was the recording of Yeats reading, which was really strange. A later part of the exhibition describes how Y created a kind of music to be played during readings, so this may have been part of that as it was a sort of singing that seemed to be going on, but if that is the case, and hence that was how he normally read his work, wow would you be hoping not to be invited around for a reading of his latest...

The exhibition also had good images and videos on various aspects of Yeats life, and then heaps of the original manuscripts of his writing - Sailing to Byantium was a completely different poem at one stage before it got rebuilt. They also had Yeats' passport, which I am jealous of, as he travelled in the time when passports got stamped - thus far it looks like I'll be travelling right around the globe and coming home stampless. 's'not fair.

Then I headed off to the National Gallery - I think Irish art is like Australian in that if you don't know anything about it, superficially at least, it just seems like a bunch of people doing whatever is being done in Europe at roundabout the same time, except that you've never heard of them. Except for Jack Yeats, conveniently, as I both really liked his work, and it made for a nicely Yeats-ified day.

The next day I had planned to wander about Dublin some more but got a better offer, in the form of a drive into the mountains around Dublin and lunch at a pub that is a decade younger than the English settlement of Australia. The scenery half an hour out of Dublin is beautiful, feels distinctly 'Irish' rather than the city which minus the green decorations, could be almost anywhere. The pub was amazing - a couple of hundred years of accumulated detritus makes for some interesting décor. And excellent food was also present.

The following day we needed to deliver a merman to Belfast so I got an unexpected, brief, driving tour of Belfast and then returned via Newgrange & Knowth, which are fascinating - sites that have been in use by humans for 6000 years, and c.3000 AD became sites for neolithic burial chambers. Absolutely amazing as these chambers were built with materials that had to be imported from quarries far away, and were constructed so they light up once a year at a seasonal solstice, and they have largely survived completely intact and watertight up until the present.

And the following day I arrived in Paris!

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Cows wearing hatracks

One of the odder things about my time in England so far was becoming hooked on the strangely compelling Autumn Watch - a BBC programme that ran for two weeks with an hour each night of live tv on the seasonal changes that Autumn brings to the UK's wildlife. Not something I can really imagine happening anywhere else. Especially as it was presented by Bill Oddie - ne'er has there been a more appropriate surname.

The show followed the progress of particular animals at this time of year - tracking geese as they fly from Canada, watching squirrels hide nuts and magpies stealing them, all the things that can kill baby seals, and the stars of the show: red deer. They spend this time of year bashing horns together to compete over who gets to mate with who.

The seasons seem to make more dramatic shifts a lot faster here which I guess makes that kind of programming a lot easier, but the English do seem to love animals A LOT. But it is definitely the best use of reality television that I have seen so far.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

Bronte-Land

Something that I still can't get over is how close together all the places are here. It's like you have been shrunken down and are living in one of those miniature villages that people with an excessive amount of time create - if I were to look up and see an enormous, delighted toddler looking down on me, I wouldn't be surprised. Terrified, but not surprised. Obviously it would be more logical to assume that I have been miniaturised than accept that things are just different here.

That is a preamble to explaining my joy in realising that Yorkshire is only an hour or two away from Newcastle, and hence, I was able to visit the home of the Brontes, who, you will recollect, lived in a parsonage in a Yorkshire village. It is a beautiful town, all grey stone buildings and narrow cobbled streets. The house itself was no doubt very nice for the time, but tiny in comparison to what our minimum requirements would be - it has 3.5 bedrooms and the Brontes were a family with six children. All of whom their father outlived. It is furnished largely with the Brontes original possessions, which The Bronte Society has been collecting since 1897, bless them. It's hard to believe that the amount of writing that the three sisters produced all came out of one tiny living room. And for any of you that may be wondering why their brother Bramwell never made a success of being an artist, there is ample evidence on the walls: he was attempting to be an artist despite bypassing learning how to paint, or having any discernible talant. No wonder the pub down the road was the main beneficiary of his munificence.

After that we drove back through the Yorkshire Dales, it was a beautiful sunny day so I missed the experience of Wuthering about on them, but I don't think that is something that I will miss too much... it is a stunningly unique landscape.

The following day I went down to York, and got to gawp at the amazing York Minster: remarkable both for having the largest Medieval stained glass window in England, beautiful architecture and fascinating history, AND because it means you get to say 'Minster' a lot, and Minster is a fun word to say. One of the funnest that the English language is furnished with, I'm sure you'll agree. Then wandered around the narrow cobbled streets in the centre of York, the buildings overhang the streets so that they almost meet in the centre, once all of York was like this. We went to Jorvik, the museum of the Viking settlement of York, which was fascinating, despite being aimed at people 15 years younger than me.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

ooh aye, like

It has been awhile hasn't it? And I will have to keep this fairly short as I am reacquainting myself with the Trills of the Modem so things are taking a bit longer than usual (ie I'm on dial-up not broadband).

Arrived in Newcastle 10 days or so ago, and am staying with my Grandma and Uncle, this is my first visit here so it has been very exciting seeing all the places I've heard about. Although the way my Dad describes it meant that it was a pleasant surprise not to have to shovel my way through six feet of snow every morning while being blown off the ground by a gale... that said, the vista currently before me is proof of Turner's accuracy in his work with mist.

Started getting acquainted with the region by a stroll up the sea front, and being intensely amused by the concept of anyone surfing in the North Sea - sure they wear wetsuits, but you would need to hollow out a dead seal to surf any later in the year in these parts. Do enjoy being able to go for a stroll and incorporate the ruins of a priory and castle (conveniently named Tynemouth Priory and Castle) located up the road. The priory was formally inhabited by an order of coalmining monks - and wouldn't you be thrilled as a young monk to find out you were going to the coalmining priory, nevermind the secluded life concocting liquers and illuminating manuscripts, no, you'll be down the mines.

Have been into Newcastle city a few times, checked out the quayside down there, which reminds me of home, as it is complete with lumpy opera house and a coathanger. Other than, you know, being on a river, and having a slightly different climate, you'd barely notice the difference. Enjoyed visiting the Baltic Centre, which is an old flour mill converted into a contemporary art 'space' - weird how central to any plans to rejuvenate an area is building a contemporary art gallery, despite how few people actually go. I was happy as they had some Takashi Murakami stuff up. Then we went to the New Castle - v. modern, built in the 11 century. Also went to Newcastle University and the gallery there, which has Schwitter's Merzbarn - Scwhitters created a series of sculptural collage constructions in the places he lived in, but none of them were destined for total success - the German one was bombed in WWII, the Norwegian one burnt down and the English one he completed one wall (of the projected four) and then had a heart attack... This latter one was going to be a total environment within an old drystone barn, and after he died the whole side of the barn was reinstalled in the art gallery.

Following day was a family road trip - we went up to Alnwick Castle and had a look around. As long as one had appropriate staffing levels, inheriting a castle wouldn't be too bad. Especially one which comes with Canalettos, a Velasquez and a few del Piombos. And where they shot part of Harry Potter. The castle has been in the family for 700 years, and when they owned the rest of Northumbria, they used to have three castles. I wonder when you start thinking 'is it too much? Oh go on, just one more castle then'. Probably around the time you defeat the Scots who are marauding about.

Will write some more soon, am off to Dublin tomorrow, then Paris on Monday. Tres bien!

Monday, October 02, 2006

Leaving on a jet train...

At least I hope it's a jet train, that would be cool.

So how did I spend my last day in London, I hear you breathlessly choke out? I've hardly given you any detail so far about my time in London, you must be hard pressed to know how I have spent every single other day since I got here...

Firstly, I would like you to note that I just edited the previous post, which had too many typos even for me to bear - but I blame this keyboard - if you were trying to type using xylophone hammers on the keyboard it would approach the irritation of this fool instrument.

Which reminds me of something, the other day, when I was walking along the Thames, under the many bridges, I had the thought, 'Wow, the accordion is possibly the most irritating instrument ever to perform in a tunnel.' Only to walk into the next tunnel and retract that immediately upon the thought 'No, the xylophone being played to a mariachi casio-keyboard backing track, now THAT is the most annoying instrument to be played in a tunnel.'

Oh, and I while I'm shedding some mental detritus, I meant to share, I saw someone famous! And this time I knew who it was! The woman from Black Books was at the Kandinsky exhibition at the same time I was! Not as exciting as seeing Kandinsky, but still exciting. And I managed not to go up to her and blather on about how much I love her work and try and demonstrate it by naming particular episodes or revealing how many times I've seen them. Well done, me!

Yesterday was rather wet. To the point that it rained even when the sun was out, and there were only a few clouds in the sky, still it steadily rained. I went to the National Gallery, to have a look at a few things again, and confirm that my view of Renoir isn't too harsh, and nope, it's not. It's an odd building - even in the main galleries I can't get any sense of where I am, (not that that means anything, I could lose a sense of location in a supermarket) but there are some weird layout choices, particularly if you go downstairs to the subterranean cafe, and then walk through a doorway on the far side of that that looks like it should lead to an education room or something, you find yourself in further galleries that have The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, a Courbet, Gericault, Ingres, Delacoix etc. Odd. I think the vast majority of visitors would completely miss them.

Anyway, after that I mooched about for a bit, loitering in shops, London when it is raining is kind of lacking in public spaces you don't have to pay to be in - this is where bookshops come in as the capital's loungerooms - and then tottered off to the Institute of Contemporary Art for a film about Derrida. I know, my last afternoon in London and I thought I would spend it watching a film on Derrida. What the hell was I thinking? Especially as I haven't even read that much Derrida. Anyway, it was entertaining if only for the fact that someone made a biopic about the author of the 'Death of the Author'. The film was a little obvious in a lot of its techniques - the opening sequence cut between footage that demonstrated Derrida's public persona (Here's Derrida lecturing! Here's Derrida on TV! Here's someone on TV gushing about Derrida! Here's American college students gauchely introducing themselves to Derrida and apparently referring to his philosophical works as 'novels'!) and footage of the domestic Derrida (Here's Derrida losing his keys! Here's his wife calling him Jacky! Here's Derrida walking down a street!). They made the film by following Derrida around for weeks and talking to him, and it was very entertaining because he refused to comply and just pretend that they weren't there, he kept saying how their being there changed how things would normally be, and whenever they asked a question, kept telling them that he wouldn't give them the full answer, and referring to the process of editing etc. And giving incredibly long preambles - they ask about deconstruction, he spends ten minutes deconstructing the context in which they are asking about deconstruction. And he was funny, and they were very serious about their process of documenting. So he won. Even if only because he kept one eyebrow raised for about a month.

After that intense level of edumication, I needed to do something that required distinctly less brain time, and got me out of the rain, so I went to the movies, I saw The Devil Wears Prada. Funny, and Meryl Streep imbues a character into what would otherwise be a caricature, and I only wanted to slap Anne Hathaway's character a little. From some angles she looks like Audrey Hepburn, that's cool.

So that was my day, and now I'm about to head off and catch a train to Newcastle!

Sunday, October 01, 2006

Of medieval dance, and my experiences thereof.

When I finished last, I was off to interview someone - everything getting there seemed to take forteen times as long as it should - realising I needed to print a consent form sending me scurrying through files, needing to get a blank cassette for the interview, trying to buy 'fast' food etc created a tedious montage of chore. The interview was a really good one though, someone I hadn't expected to meet, so a bonus to my time in London. She ran a gallery in London in the 1960s on the Kings Road: it would be harder to be cooler than that, without, I don't know, knowing John Lennon, but hang on, she did.

Friday I was tired. Not for any particular reason, just tired, and generally grumpy. There was some pouting, and some stern looks directed in various quarters. I went to the National Gallery, where they have opened what is effectively a 'greatest hits' selection of works from the nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries collection. They have moved them into the Sainsbury Wing because of the upcoming Velasquez exhibition and renamed them the 'Manet to Picasso Exhibition' (ie the stuff we can't take off the walls without crushing expectations with abandon). So for me it was another chance to get up close and canvassy with things I've known for a long time. And confirm, once again, that I really do not like Renoir. I really don't. The guy paints the most insipid, wuss-bag, bleary gimps known to canvas. (Well okay, it seems unlikely that they were actually gimps, but I think you probably understand I'm venting right now). Take, for instance, The Umbrellas, now, I think that the painting on the main figure's dress, and the umbrellas, but especially the dress, is stunning, the modulation in the colours is beautiful, and if I could that bit out and keep it, I'd be very happy indeed. Sacrilegious, and in prison, but happy. But the faces are so SO irritating. Possibly I've just read a little too much about theories of the flaneur and apparently how to look at this work is to put ourselves in the position of the gentleman of the street, checking out the ladies and about to be found out as the gentlman accompanying the young lady is bound BOUND! to follow the girl's gaze and SPROING! find us out for checkin' out da laydees. The kind of tension and drama that only a pre-filmic generation could appreciate. Even watching, say, Shakespeare, for example, and, in, say, Antony and Cleopatra, if there was to be a say, gunshot sound, and you weren't quite expecting it but, for example, happened to be drinking a glass of red wine, an amount of it could then be slopped down one's front. Just as a hypothetical example of what could happen as a response to true narrative tension. I can't imagine anyone at the original Impressionist Salon reacting, beverages akimbo, Mon dieu! Le vin rougue est sur mon shirt! Le tension! J'ai regarde la laydee, et le monsieur! He is about to look AT ME!' So startling you would naturally forget how to speak french and start speaking fluent English! Anyway, most of Renoir's women seem to have the same head, and him going down on the record as a misogynist was never going to endear the man to me.

Anyway. Finally! Saw Van Gogh's Sunflowers, which I think have so much press that seeing them is I think in the same category as the Mona Lisa (althought I'll get back to on that... ): it is so mediated by previous imagery that it is hard to actually see it. But the background is a lot lighter than I expected, and that creates the radiance of the image, rather than the actual sunflowers, which are mangier than I expected them to be. I prefer Van Gogh's Chair though, as the colours in that aren't captured in reproductions, and are a lot more subtle.

The Degas were mixed, as ever with Degas I think - if I was to see a whole room of these I think the tetchy flag would be flying along the lines of Enough with naked bathing chicks already! Leave the house! But they are incredible drawings, and the colours in them are remarkable. Also this, which I've also loved, probably because I tend to see several different shades of red with a touch of black as enough of a palette for anyone, and I love how it teeters on abstraction but still reconciles the form. I had always thought of it as being quite a relaxing picture, but looking at it the other day noticed how much pain the combed girl seems to be experiencing.

Unfortunately the Cezannes are going to be in an exhibition 'Cezanne in Britain' opening two days after I leave London, so I won't see them this time around (but I'm going to have to make time to see the Velasquez as I traverse Engerland, so all is not lost). I'll spare you any further discussion of everything else I saw there.

I left the gallery, and wandered about, pouting, because I had done my looking for the day. Found myself to Borders, found an armchair, and read a book for some hours. I do love the modern corporate bookstore: they are enormous so they have great stuff and their staff don't care if you sit there for hours. And being a massive global chain you know that you will be buying many more books from them, so don't feel too bad for reading their merchandise. But no-one by me Bill Bryson's latest for Christmas okay? It's a lovely light read, but it only takes three hours, so I'm done. Is a good book, a memoir of his early years in 1950s Iowa and the times as they were, parts of which reprise a little too much of his earlier books, and there is a little bit too much of the nostalgia shiny-happy-fifties-glow, but there is also a tale of how his mother once sent him to school wearing his sister's capri pants, and Iowa may have been a simple place in the 1950s, but they recognised when a small child is wearing his sister's pants.

After that I wandered up Edgeware Rd and had dinner at one of the many Lebanese restaurants, which are delicious, the Kebabs in aus will never be the same again, and then I wandered home, playing Fruit Lotto along the way - which is when you buy a piece of fruit you are not familiar with in the hope that it will be your New Fruit Sensation, and eat it to find out if it is. The one I chose is not my new Fruit Sensation, and has left me with a question mark about whether everyone else on that street was thinking 'wow, I've never seen anyone eat one of those raw and/or unpeeled before' because it was a strange fruit.

This morning was a day of some excitement, as I have been seeing quite a few pamphlets advertising 'Open Rehearsal' - which is a weekend in which many of the major music and theatre groups open up their doors for the public to witness their rehearsal. Being a philistine when it comes to classical music - I'm not that eager to go and see a symphony play, let alone rehearse, unless you can guarantee me that the conducter will take a step back off the podium and sprawl inelegantly onto the stage - I, of course, headed for the Globe, where I thought *thought* that I would witness actors preparing a play. I probably should have considered the fact that they are two thirds of the way through the current season, so unlikely to be rehearsing, what with performing at least once a day. So perhaps should have expected to be participating in a workshop. But the description made it sound like a discussion on the theme of Love in Shakespeare, by describing as 'a discussion on the theme of Love in Shakespeare'. Rather than workshops on voice (good, if lacking any sense of direction) followed by one learning a medieval circle dance. Some of you have seen me attempt to perform Nutbush City Limits and watched me reliably go in the opposite direction Every.Single.Time so you can imagine the aptitude I displayed. But it was fun, and I can now crap on about when I danced at the Globe...

Then I went and saw 'In Extremis' - a contemporary play about Abelard and Heloise, which has completely erased the unfortunate telling of that tale using puppets in 'Being John Malkovich' and replaced it with a much better version - hooray! Although I suspect that when the first Globe was there, there was a lot less distraction caused by the flight path.