Other Culture (film, media, fine art, exhibitions, other people’s writing etc.) – Page 10

Robert Rauschenberg, plus Wilfredo Lam, Tate Modern, 6 December 2016

An appointment to view the Robert Rauschenberg arranged a long time ago, as Janie takes advantage of her Tate membership so we can see the exhibition on a members’ evening.

Janie came to the Z/Yen office to meet me. We then walked from Lothbury to the Tate Modern across Southwark Bridge – a pleasant 20 minutes or so walk when the weather is good, which it was.

We got to the Tate ahead of the special evening opening hours, so we went to the members’ bar and had a small “glass of” each to sustain ourselves for the exhibition.

When we staggered down the stairs to go to the Rauschenberg, we first encountered the entrance for the Wilfredo Lam, which the Tate had also opened up for the evening to enable members to see both exhibitions out of hours. “Why not?” we thought and gave the Wilfredo Lam a quick once-over. We’d seen a fair smattering of his works in Cuba and remembered that he wasn’t exactly our favourite. A bit austere. “Picasso-lite” I described it – probably not an entirely original comment.

Then the Rauschenberg, the real purpose of our visit. Both of us had seen some of his stuff before and liked it, but neither of us had seen much and we both knew little about him.

Janie latched on to his abstract expressionist roots and started sounding off about the absence of such artists as Rauschenberg and Cy Twombly in the exhibition of that name at the Royal Academy, which we visited to hat-losing effect a few weeks ago – click here. It was interesting to learn that Rauschenberg and Twombly had been romantically entangled when young.

We both like his use of colour and some of the earlier, experimental works are interesting. I didn’t much like the transfer drawings but clearly this technique was a step on the path towards his astonishing silkscreen work, which we both find very pleasing and interesting.

The later work is a bit hit and miss. Rauschenberg was bound to be fascinated by the use of digital imaging as part of his work in later years, yet somehow I think the cruder, analogue methods produce more interesting work in his genre.

Well worth seeing, the Rauschenberg exhibition.

A Gresham Society Visit To See The Gresham Music Collection And Other Treasures, The Guildhall Library, 29 November 2016

Henry Purcell: The Gresham Autograph. Source: http://www.omifacsimiles.com/brochures/images/purcell_1.jpg

Awesome.

I don’t use that word in the youthful, throw-away sense that I have been known to lampoon elsewhere – click here for an example.

I mean that some of the items I saw this evening really did inspire awe. That rare, tingling feeling at the back of my neck when seeing an especially stunning drama unfolding in an unexpected way, or hearing a wonderful piece of music, or seeing a rare, thought-provoking and/or beautiful artefact.

This was a very interesting Gresham Society outing, albeit so close to Gresham home turf that the word “outing” seems barely appropriate. The Guildhall is just off Gresham Street and around the corner from the old Gresham College; perhaps an “innings” rather than an outing for the Gresham Society.

Anyway, Dr Peter Ross provided a fascinating introduction, explaining the story of the Guildhall Library and its historical collections, of which the Gresham Music Collection is but one. Here is a link to Dr Ross’s Gresham lecture on the subject; more generally detailed but less oriented towards the Gresham Collection than the talk he gave us. Irene, one of our Gresham Society members, was a librarian at the Guildhall Library as a youngster, so she could fill in some details too.

I hadn’t realised the diversity of subject matter contained in the collection. I knew to expect music books and I knew that the Guildhall Collection generally had a massive collection of books about London; my cousin Sidney would have been in his element for those. But also many books on food in the Gresham Collection and fascinating books about travel, inventions and mechanical devices.

After the illustrated talk, Peter then showed us around the many artefacts he had lovingly laid out around the library for us to glance at and (in the case of more robust/less rare items) examine.

Among the most interesting to me, a rare manuscript of Spem In Alium by Thomas Tallis, a favourite piece of mine. The rarity of this manuscript is two-fold. Firstly, it is documented as a “grandchild” of an original autograph – those are extremely rare for words of such antiquity and especially so for this work. Secondly, it contains a forty-first part for this forty-part piece.

Several of us wondered how the extra Spem part might have come about. I imagined a much simplified part, to allow a keen but profoundly untalented enthusiast like me to join in the singing. But that is mere conjecture for our “post-factual” era. Perhaps a truthful answer lies in the learned notes (mentioning the Gresham) contained in the version of the score shown in this link – click here.

One very beautiful travel book, Victorian era I should imagine, included a description and illustration of musicians in Aleppo. My slightly cack-handed smart phone image below does not do justice to the picture.

Coincidentally, Janie and I are going to see Basel Rajoub (a musician from Aleppo) together with his Soriana Project and Wu Man, this Friday at the Wigmore Hall – (Ogblog item on that concert to follow shortly), so this exhibit seemed especially poignant to me that day.

(Janie and I think about Aleppo a lot at the moment. Not many people we know had, like us, the good fortune to visit that beautiful city some years ago – we look at our photos from Aleppo often these days – click here.)

But the highlight of the artefacts was the Purcell Autograph from the Gresham Music Collection. That was the item that really made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

Source: http://www.omifacsimiles.com/brochures/images/purcell_1.jpg

In order to ensure we were in the right mood for the Purcell Autograph, Peter Ross put on some suitable Purcell Music. I didn’t realise until later that he really was playing the music from the autograph we were observing; the contents of the autograph were recorded some years ago and the recording is still available as a CD or download. I have downloaded the album and am listening to it with great pleasure as I write. It can be obtained through Amazon – click here...and other places too no doubt.

Libations and nibbles were available in the lecture room, at a safe distance from the precious books. The Gresham Society people are always delightful company. I believe that the merriment continued afterwards in a nearby watering hole; I needed to retreat quite early having irritatingly accepted an early morning speaking engagement in Southampton the next day. Still, this evening at the Guildhall Library will live long and happily in my memory.

Abstract Expressionism, Royal Academy, 11 November 2016

We’d both been really looking forward to seeing this exhibition, without quite getting around to seeing it; prioritising other “more urgent” things, as th Abstract Expressionism is running until January and as a member Janie can get us in any time.

We had booked out the time to see the exhibition on this day and were quite determined to see it, although with Janie feeling poorly the day before, I was half expecting us to defer the visit yet again.

But Janie woke up on this Friday feeling better and was keen to go ahead with the visit after getting some other bits and pieces out of the way.

Naturally, it was quite late by the time we set off for the Royal Academy, which actually worked out well with the late night opening. No congestion charge, no parking charges and a reasonably clear run around Mayfair/Piccadilly.

The Royal Academy has a good resource on this show with some very good examples – click here.

We both really liked the show, without necessarily liking all the work. Barnett Newman has always left me cold and I was not so impressed by the David Smith sculptures. This is big, “wall space” art in truth.

Reviews are a little mixed:

We thought the show worked very well as a whole. Very colourful. Also very interesting, as we were familiar with some of the works and artists but not really on the Abstract Expressionists as a school. We suspect that many non-expert visitors shared our sense of enjoyment along with the sense that we learnt something too.

Janie was convinced that Cy Twombly should have been in there, even asking one of the shop attendants to look Cy up for her and then explain why Cy was absent. It transpires that Twombly’s work is later, modern romantic symbolism, not abstract expressionism. Bad call, Janie.

The Radical Eye: Modernist Photography From The Sir Elton John Collection, Tate Modern, Then On To A Z/Yen Alumni Drinks Gathering At The Phoenix, 9 November 2016

As a Tate Modernista, Janie gets invited to previews and we are keen to take advantage of those when we are able. For that reason, we had booked out this particular afternoon, which also turned out to be the one date that worked for several Z/Yen alumni for a gathering.

It wasn’t complicated; we decided to combine both, making the timing of the Tate Modern visit fit nicely into that late afternoon slot.

So we worked in the morning and over lunchtime, then met up at the Tate Modern around 15:30 to see The Radical Eye: Modernist Photography From The Sir Elton John Collection – click here for details.

It is an eclectic but fine collection; I very much enjoyed seeing the many Man Ray and André Kertész examples (I’ve long been a fan of theirs), but was also especially taken by the Dorothea Lange portraits, which I thought were especially good and with which I was not so familiar.

Then on to The Phoenix on Throgmorton Street, via the office. When we arrived, Linda was worried that it might just be we three, but I think she was just fretting a little because one or two people had to drop out at the last minute. Steph, Mary, Richard, Elisabeth and Christiano all turned up, which made a good size of group.

Janie and I didn’t stay all that long; Janie had booked early work for the next morning and was starting to struggle a little with a niggling abscess. So I took her home, cooked some pasta with one of Alistair Little’s ragus and put the wee bairn to bed early.

Luxury Travel Fair, Olympia West and Revolutions Weekender, V&A, 4 to 6 November 2016

6-november-2016-va — Doesn’t look all that revolting to me.

Janie and I arranged a day off on the Friday (4th) primarily to visit the Luxury Travel Fair. Conde Nast Traveller Magazine had bunged Janie a couple of freebie tickets and we are seeking ideas for our next trip.

We had also wanted to keep some extra time free for the weekend as the V&A had mysteriously pre-announced that there would be a weekend of activities around the Revolution Exhibition – which we saw in preview a couple of months ago – click here. Janie had chased this up a couple of times but we only got the programme about a week before – still several items looked good.

Here’s a link to that very V&A programme – click here.

I didn’t hold much hope for the travel fair, so wasn’t too disappointed when Janie announced that she needed to get Bill to sort out a problem with the boiler at the house and that first thing Friday was the ideal time. Naturally, that took up the whole morning, so in the end we got to the travel fair around 14:45.

There were a few interesting stands, but on the whole the larger agents had sent their “B” teams to staff the stands and very few of the smaller agents covered holidays that might appeal to us. Cruise anyone? Not us.

So we had bags of time to get to the V&A for the first thing we wanted to see: a movie entitled Louder Than Love by Tony D’Annunzio which was due to be shown at 18:15. We got there about half an hour early, to discover that the movies were running early so that piece was playing to an empty room as we arrived and we caught the last 20-25 minutes of it. Probably got enough out of it that way nonetheless. Roger Daltry and Alice Cooper being the most interesting people from that scene still alive and their interviews were in that last reel.

That timing shift enabled us to see John Lennon “In His Own Write” that same evening. This is basically a performance piece based on John Lennon’s 1964 poetry book of that name. Cartoons too, projected onto a screen. The performers; Jonathan Glew, Peter Caulfield and Cassie Vallance, were all very good. Some of the poems were good; some very silly, some horribly violent. Still, certainly an hour well spent before dinner.

We also saw a small exhibit about Glastonbury and danced for a while in a rub-a-dub stylee to Babylon Uprising. Not quite “Janie and Ian, the only one’s dancing”…but not far off.

Sunday 6 November

After a cold game of tennis at Boston Manor, we went straight to the V&A to see a conversation between Joe Boyd and Nigel Waymouth. We were keen to see this, not least because Joe is a client of Janie’s and I found his book White Bicycles fascinating.

I thought I should try to sport some fitting gear, given our incongruous “just off the tennis court” look, so I wore the tee-shirt Kim had made for me from Janie’s “guru on a camper-van” picture which she used as the 60’s party invite in the spring:

img_1471-2

I also thought I should sport one of my most psychedelic-looking bandannas. It was indeed all in keeping with the subject matter of the conversation, just as I thought, although perhaps not so much in keeping with the way the rather elderly (on the whole) audience was dressed.

We ran into Brian Eno briefly before the session started. I don’t think he stayed for the session, so must have been popping in to see Joe before the start.

At the end of the session Janie asked Joe Boyd a rather penetrating question about commercialism (or rather lack thereof), which I thought was by far the most interesting question (and indeed answer) in the Q&A bit of the event. Whether or not Joe will have anything more to do with Janie after that question is hard to say. I’ll guess yes.

Mousse Wine Tasting Of Syrah Wines Plus Gerry Goddin’s Unexpected Foray Into the World Of Eurovision, 2 November 2016

For reasons explained a little later in this piece, I did not write up this extraordinary and memorable evening at the time. It was only on learning (in August 2020) that Gerry Goddin has died, that I uncovered my omission and decided to put matters right.

I met Helen Baker and her delightful Mousse Wines project through Gerry. That story is written up in my report of my first visit to a Mousse Wine Tasting – here and below:

Mousse Wine Tasting, Rossi & Brunelli di Montalcino, 28 September 2015

Janie came with me more often than not to the several subsequent wine tastings I attended. Most if not all are written up to some extent on Ogblog. Janie and I often combined those tastings with visits to the Tate Modern or some other “day off” activity that pleased us.

Ahead of the 2 November 2016 visit, I received a somewhat surprising (in a pleasing way) note from Helen Baker:

Looking forward to seeing you and Janie tomorrow.
This is just to let you know that as well as the wine tasting, there will be private screening of a Eurovision entry. You may well recognise the singer and the songwriter from previous incarnations…..and maybe also the filmmaker…..

It transpired that Gerry Goddin had, unbeknown to many of us who have known him for decades through comedy writing, an avocation in writing songs of a more serious nature.

My reply to Helen:

Sounds ominous/looking forward to it. Perhaps the Eurovision entry will seem more enticing once some of that sumptuous wine has been consumed!

Helen persisted:

It’s really good – Gerry wrote the song and the rest is a co-operation courtesy of serendipity at The CABIN.
Frankly, I’m hoping the wine measures up…

Typically for Gerry, although he (or rather, his work) was star billing at this event, Gerry was unfashionably late, to the extent that Helen didn’t want to get the wine tasting into full sway and/but there wasn’t much we could do other than socialise while waiting for Gerry.

Janie and I enjoyed getting to know a bit better “The Cabin” team that had put the Eurovision entry together. Janie recalls that it was a wet evening and that eventually, amid the umbrellas and anonymous commuters who periodically hovered outside the cabin, Gerry’s face appeared at the window, perhaps struggling to work out where the door was located.

Anyway, Helen Baker was absolutely right when she said the Eurovision song was very good, both as a piece of writing and in performance. In fact, I think pretty much everyone gathered there agreed that the song and performance were both so good that it was almost unthinkable that it might be selected to be the UK’s Eurovision Song Contest entry. We were absolutely right on that point too.

We also enjoyed the wine tasting, which focussed on some yummy Syrah grape-based wines, from Cornas, Cote-Rotie and Washington State.

I think we were rewarded with the song video again towards the end of the evening, but Janie and I remember less about the end of the evening than about the beginning of it.

I remember discussing Gerry’s more serious song writing with him during the evening and we resolved that he would send me some lyrics and chords so I might have a go at playing some of his work, including the potential Eurovision song, on my four-string. But as was often the way with Gerry, he didn’t follow through with that, neither by e-mail nor when we next met up, at that year’s Christmas Ivan Shakespeare dinner – the second of three described through this link (or click below):

Three Seasonal Events In Four Days, 13 to 16 December 2016

I held back on writing up that superb and memorable Eurovision Wine Tasting Evening while awaiting those materials. Of course they might yet come, through the “Cabin Crew” or Gerry’s executors.

I, Daniel Blake, Gate Picturehouse, 23 October 2016

Superb movie, this. I, Daniel Blake – click here for IMDb entry.

Janie and I had both been tracking this one for a few weeks. Our original plan was to see it at the Curzon, but the nifty timing of 15:20 at The Gate, together with the chance to pop in to the flat afterwards to pick up one or two things, won it for the Gate Picturehouse.

What we didn’t know when we bought the tickets online was that the heating in the Gate had broken down, making the experience doubly bleak.

I mean, you don’t go to a Ken Loach film for heartwarming, do you? You go for bleak. Still, you don’t actually need to feel physically cold and experience personal suffering to empathise with victims of our country’s heartless benefits system, in chilly Newcastle.

So, Janie and I suffered for our art, but it was worth it.

The movie especially highlights how inflexible our state bureaucratic systems are, so if you fall foul of them or make a mistake or have a mistake made about you when you are in an especially vulnerable position, matters can spiral out of control and out of hand so easily.

It also highlights how very dispossessed are those people who do not have ready access to on-line facilities and/or do not have the skills to use information systems.

Ken Loach has previous at highlighting big social issues and making things happen about them; Cathy Come Home being perhaps the most memorable example. I hope there is a reaction and some social change on the back of I, Daniel Blake.

Not as relentlessly grim as some Ken Loach films, as there were glimpses of humanity throughout the film. The kindly job centre employee being reprimanded by her boss for trying to help Daniel…”I’ve told you before, it might set a precedent…” was especially chilling. A scene at a food bank was heartbreaking.

I don’t often implore people to see stuff, but this really is one of those films that ought to be seen by as many people as possible. The film is also an excellent piece of drama. Go see it.

An Interesting Day Culminating With Twenty Minutes Spent Watching Dire Situation Comedy, 11 October 2016

People who know me well know that I watch very little television other than cricket and news.

So how did an interesting day end with me watching extracts from not one but two dire situation comedy shows? Here’s how.

I had arranged to meet Richard Goatley at lunchtime after a noonday game of real tennis at Lord’s. My game went very well as it happens, as evidenced by Richard who popped in to see the final point and asked if I wanted to start our meeting with some lunch in the Tavern, which I did.

Over lunch, before getting down to business proper, Richard and I chatted about a myriad of topics, including a rather geeky conversation about per capita GDP in various European countries and then, somehow, the subject of dire situation comedy shows on television.

Richard asked me if I had ever seen a show named “Come Back Mrs Noah” with Mollie Sugden in the lead. It was set in the year 2050 on a spaceship that was accidentally launched with a housewife and reluctant scientists on board. I confessed that I had not. Richard told me that I simply had to watch the first episode (which is available on YouTube) for its sheer direness, although he suspected that I wouldn’t last the full 30 minutes.

Richard googled “Mrs Noah” to extract some details about the show’s provenance and found a list of the 10 most dire situation comedy shows which included one, “Heil Honey, I’m Home”, about Hitler and Eva Braun, which neither of us had ever come across.

When dividing up the action points at the end of the meeting proper (yes, we did discuss plenty of real Middlesex CCC strategy business, thank you), we agreed that I would watch said episode of “Mrs Noah” and Richard would track down “Heil Honey”.

Come Back Mrs Noah was not hard to find – even easier for you – click here for the first 10 minute reel and (if you can bear it) you’ll see links to the other reels too.

Mrs Noah was not quite as bad as Richard led me to expect, although it was bad. There was one really prescient joke right at the start when the newsreader mentioned “The Margaret Thatcher Memorial Statue in Moscow’s Red Square”. As the show was written in 1977, 18 months before Thatcher came to power, I thought that was an intriguing joke to set in 2050.

There was a very non-PC 1970s joke in which the spaceship’s lift spoke with a rather unconvincing Trini-meets-Bajan accent and the reporter says, “they make the lifts in Notting Hill Gate nowadays”.

Another non-PC joke (presumably set to be a runner) was a sentient camera that was said to be able to frame and focus on the most interesting part of any scene; the device continuously followed Mollie Sugden around, clearly pointing its lens at er bust.

My dad would have laughed at that runner, as he would have laughed at the runner in which the computerised vending machine for making tea or whatever emitted a fart sound before dispensing its contents. I quite liked the idea of the computer (in the hands of posh, unworldly scientists) taking far longer to botch up making a cup of tea than it would take for a competent person simply to make a cup of tea. Indeed I enjoyed the notion that the whole enterprise was Heath Robinson-like – an unconfident, comedic, British answer to Star Trek.

But 10 to 12 minutes in I could see where the show/series was going (nowhere near orbit, I fancied) and what most of the runners were going to be. It wasn’t all that bad – it seemed to me no worse than other shows from the same stable, “Are You Being Served”, “It Ain’t Half Hot Mum” etc., faint praise as I always found those shows lame. I gave up after 15 minutes.

I’d put aside the full 30 minutes, so I decided to track down “Heil Honey I’m Home”, which was also pretty easy to find – even easier for you – click here.

Heil Honey is truly terrible. Exceptionally awful. Simply not funny. This is not because of the subject matter – I have seen and heard Hitler made funny a few times – the show simply does not present a potentially funny scenario. Perhaps the idea (Hitler in a suburban American home) would be worth a one minute sketch, along the lines of a sketch I remember fondly, the “Mr Hitler Joins An Assertiveness Training Course” sketch – (was that on the Burkiss Way or Radio Active or something else?). But even a one minute sketch needs a joke or two.

Heil Honey I’m Home is a crime against hilarity. It brought to mind the late great Ivan Shakespeare’s uncharacteristically catty line about a comedy writer whose work he didn’t like, “he basically only has the one joke, which he recycles in every sketch he writes…and the sad part is…his one joke isn’t funny.” Ouch.

The Heil Honey title did remind me of one of my weirdest lyric writing episodes, “I Only Have Heils for You”, only partially explained, with the lyrics set out – click here – I think you’ll laugh reading this.

I lasted five minutes on “Heil Honey”; I think I showed perseverance staying for five. I didn’t laugh once. But worth the experience as I now know where my lowest comedy ebb sits. Thanks Richard.

Julieta, Curzon Mayfair, 10 September 2016

After my first international representative appearance for the MCC against the visiting Australians at Lord’s, Janie and I went on to the Curzon Mayfair to see the new Almodóvar movie, Julieta.

We thought it was an absolutely excellent movie; interesting story, beautiful cinematography, fine acting, the lot.

If you want to know all about it, here is the IMDb entry for the movie.

It has received very good reviews on the whole:

I guess Almodóvar movies aren’t everyone’s style, but when he’s on form we love his movies. This one was just the ticket for us that evening, rounding off a thoroughly enjoyable day.

You Say You Want a Revolution? Records and Rebels 1966-1970, V&A, 9 September 2016

Turn off your mind, relax and float down stream to the V&A.

We were fortunate, through Janie’s membership, to be able to attend the members’ preview of this wonderful exhibition late afternoon/early evening.

The exhibition is well described on the V&A site here.

We both absolutely loved the exhibition.

Of course, the sixties is still very much on our minds in the aftermath of Janie and Kim’s groovy happening – OK, so the above photo is from that happening, not the exhibition.

Still, you could be forgiven for thinking that the V&A curator might have been hanging out at our groovy happening taking notes ahead of the exhibition.

They used a similar mind-blowing sound-bleed technique as the one we used at the party in the themed rooms.

The penultimate room in the exhibition is a sixties festivals room, with festival memorabilia, Woodstock (the movie) on a loop and AstroTurf on the ground so you can chill in a sixties-rock-fest-stylee.

It is a great show. If you read this posting in time (I think it runs to February 2017) get thee a ticket to the V&A show and surry down to South Kensington to see the show. You won’t be disappointed.

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