Monthly Archives: March 2017

THE 2017 BADA FAIR

BADA 2017, Duke of York Square, King’s Road, London SW3, 15th — 21st March 2017

Joseph Walsh (b. 1979)
Lilium I – A Unique Sculptural Form
2014
Olive Ash
325 x 215 x 74 cm
Courtesy Peter Petrou © Peter Petrou

From the moment you arrive at the BADA Fair you know that you have come to a place which will inspire and tempt you to buy pieces for your home or collection – things which you can live with and enjoy and understand why you acquired them.

An Irish George III white statuary marble and brocatelle marble chimneypiece of Neo-classical design,
Attributed to George Hill and Arthur Darley.
Courtesy of Mallett

The noted firm of Mallett’s are exhibiting there for the first time and as always provide an interesting selection to choose from.

A lantern in parcel-gilt bronze in the Gothic style.
Courtesy of Mallett

It’s hard to believe that this is the twenty-fifth BADA Fair and one feature that has always drawn interest and appreciation is the Loan Exhibition and this year’s is no exception. Entitled Samuel Prout: A Grand Tour in Watercolour it celebrates the life and work of Samuel Prout (1783-1852) from his simple beginnings to achieving the status of being ‘Painter in Water-Colours in Ordinary’ to both King George IV and Queen Victoria. His highly detailed works revealed the cities and towns of Europe to his wealthy compatriots who were once again able to do a ‘Grand Tour’ following the defeat of Napoleon. One can quite understand why his views of Venice are so popular. The exhibition has some thirty works drawn from both private and public collections and has been organised by John Spink of John Spink Fine Watercolours.

Samuel Prout (1783–1852)
Ducal Palace, Venice
Circa 1828
Watercolour with scratching out
69.8 x 101.2 cm
Courtesy John Spink © John Spink

 

www.badafair.com

Child’s Play

Mark Neville – Child’s Play, The Foundling Museum, 40 Brunswick Square, London WC1, until 30th April 2017

Mark Neville, 'Arts and Crafts at Somerford Grove Adventure Playground', 2011, courtesy Mark Neville and Alan Cristea Gallery

Mark Neville,
‘Arts and Crafts at Somerford Grove Adventure Playground’, 2011,
courtesy Mark Neville and Alan Cristea Gallery

We should consider ourselves fortunate that the artist Mark Neville often focuses on social issues in his projects and this exhibition, appropriately held at The Foundling Museum, is an important one.

Mark Neville, 'The Jungle Book Rehearsals, Sewickley Academy', 2012, courtesy Mark Neville

Mark Neville,
‘The Jungle Book Rehearsals, Sewickley Academy’, 2012,
courtesy Mark Neville

Child’s Play combines Mark Neville’s photographs with a book and on March 20th a symposium looking at play in our cities today.

Mark-Neville, 'Boy with Hoop in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya' 2016, courtesy Mark Neville

Mark-Neville,
‘Boy with Hoop in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya’ 2016,
courtesy Mark Neville

The photographs look at children at play in this country from Port Glasgow to London, Pittsburgh, Canada, the Ukraine, Afghanistan and Kenya. While the images capture children in the act of playing whatever the circumstances of where they live they serve as reminder and inspiration for all of us to get involved to make sure that children’s universal right to play as recognised by the UN is not allowed to vanish and be ignored. They are our future and we owe it to them.

Mark Neville,- 'Child, Jacket, Slaughtered Goat, Sweets, Painted Nails, Xmas Day, Helmand’, 2010, courtesy Mark Neville

Mark Neville,-
‘Child, Jacket, Slaughtered Goat, Sweets, Painted Nails, Xmas Day, Helmand’, 2010,
courtesy Mark Neville

foundlingmuseum.org.uk

Open: Tuesday – Saturday 10:00 – 17:00, Sunday 11:00 – 17:00, Monday closed

Meet the Breugels!

Bruegel: Defining a Dynasty, The Holburne Museum, Great Pulteney Street, Bath BA2, until 4th June 2017

Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Wedding Dance in the Open Air, Oil on panel, 36.6 x 49cm, ©Holburne Museum. Photography by Dominic Brown

Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Wedding Dance in the Open Air,
Oil on panel, 36.6 x 49cm,
©Holburne Museum. Photography by Dominic Brown

This is a very special show for it reveals the Holburne’s Wedding Dance in the Open Air, following conservation and technical examination, to be by Pieter Brueghel the Younger and not as previously thought a work by a follower. Congratulations are due to their then Director Jennifer Scott (who is now Director of Dulwich Picture Gallery) who discovered it in the Museum’s store room and who co-curated this exhibition with Dr Amy Orrock.

Jan Brueghel the Elder, A Stoneware Vase of Flowers, c. 1607–1608, oil on panel, 56 × 89.5 cm, © The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridg

Jan Brueghel the Elder, A Stoneware Vase of Flowers, c. 1607–1608,
oil on panel, 56 × 89.5 cm,
© The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

Visitors when they enter the exhibition can see a Bruegel family tree and the exhibition reveals the work of the family across four generations through thirty-five pictures drawn from the National Gallery, the Royal Collection Trust, the National Trust, the Fitzwilliam Museum, the Ashmolean Museum and the Barber Institute of Fine Arts.  The Holburne Museum with its three works by Pieter Brueghel the Younger holds the largest collection of his paintings in the UK.

Still Life with Cheese, circle of Jan Van Kessel II, c. 1650 Oil on copper, 16.5 x 20.3cm, © Holburne Museum

Still Life with Cheese, circle of Jan Van Kessel II, c. 1650
Oil on copper, 16.5 x 20.3cm,
© Holburne Museum

The exhibition starts with the Adoration of the Kings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (note he did not spell his name with an h) which hangs alongside a similarly entitled work by his father-in-law Pieter Coecke van Aelst. It makes an interesting comparison. Bruegel’s sons Pieter and Jan and their descendants such as Jan van Kessel the Elder or David Teniers the Younger who married into the family are eloquently represented.

David Teniers the Younger, Boy Blowing Bubbles, c.1640, Oil on panel, 22 x 22cm, © Holburne Museum

David Teniers the Younger, Boy Blowing Bubbles, c.1640,
Oil on panel, 22 x 22cm,
© Holburne Museum

It is interesting to see how Pieter and Jan produced copies of their father’s compositions and variations of them.  Jan could arguably be said to be the first to have depicted floral studies in a style which continues to this day. This is an exhibition that celebrates Flemish painting and this prolific family whose works have not lost their appeal over the centuries.

Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Visit to a Farmhouse, c.1620-30, Oil on panel, 36.5 x 49.4cm, © Holburne Museum. Photograph by Dan Brown

Pieter Brueghel the Younger, Visit to a Farmhouse, c.1620-30,
Oil on panel, 36.5 x 49.4cm,
© Holburne Museum. Photograph by Dan Brown

http://www.holburne.org

Vanessa Bell & Patti Smith

Vanessa Bell (1879–1961), Dulwich Picture Gallery, Gallery Road, London SE21, until 4th June 2017

Vanessa Bell, Virginia Woolf, c. 1912, oil on board, 40 x 34 cm, National Portrait Gallery, London, NPG 5933. © National Portrait Gallery, London

Vanessa Bell,
Virginia Woolf, c. 1912,
oil on board, 40 x 34 cm,
National Portrait Gallery, London, NPG 5933.
© National Portrait Gallery, London

This exhibition celebrates the work of Vanessa Bell who, whilst regarded as a member of the Bloomsbury Group, was also very much a stand-alone artist in her own right.

Vanessa Bell, Asheham House, 1912, Oil on board, 47 x 53.5 cm, Private Collection. © The Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy of Henrietta Garnett. Photo credit: Photography by Matthew Hollow

Vanessa Bell,
Asheham House, 1912,
Oil on board, 47 x 53.5 cm,
Private Collection.
© The Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy of Henrietta Garnett. Photo credit: Photography by Matthew Hollow

The show traces her move from her earlier Impressionist-based training to her more radical approach featuring form, colour and abstraction. Often Bell gets somewhat overshadowed by the circle she lived in – Virginia Woolf (sister), Clive Bell (husband), and fellow artists Duncan Grant and Roger Fry. We see how she rejected Victorian concepts of motherhood and home-making to create a place of freedom as her work with the Omega Workshop reveals.

Vanessa Bell 1879–1961, Design for Omega Workshops Fabric, 1913, Watercolor, gouache, and graphite on paper, Image: 53.3 × 40.7 cm, Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Fund. 3353 - B1992.14.2 © The Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy of Henrietta Garnett

Vanessa Bell 1879–1961,
Design for Omega Workshops Fabric, 1913,
Watercolor, gouache, and graphite on paper, Image: 53.3 × 40.7 cm,
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Fund. 3353 – B1992.14.2
© The Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy of Henrietta Garnett

Sarah Milroy, the show’s curator, says: “Unconventional in her approach to both art and life, Bell’s art embodies many of the progressive ideas that we still are grappling with today, expressing new ideas about gender roles, sexuality, personal freedom, pacifism, social and class mores and the open embrace of non-British cultures. This is the perfect moment in which to re-evaluate Bloomsbury, and Bell’s legacy within it, and we look forward to affirming her importance to a contemporary audience.”

Vanessa Bell,
The Other Room, late 1930s,
161 x 174 cm,
Private Collection,
© The Estate of Vanessa Bell, courtesy of Henrietta Garnett. Photo credit: Photography by Matthew Hollow

 

 

Brandon Camp, 1913. From top left: Julian Stephen, Daphne Olivier, Noel Olivier, Noel Olivier, Roger Fry, Vanessa Bell Photographs by Vanessa Bell and others, in Vanessa Bell’s album, Tate (TGA 9020/3) © Tate Archive, London 2016.

Brandon Camp, 1913. From top left: Julian Stephen, Daphne Olivier, Noel Olivier, Noel Olivier, Roger Fry, Vanessa Bell
Photographs by Vanessa Bell and others, in Vanessa Bell’s album, Tate (TGA 9020/3)
© Tate Archive, London 2016.

Alongside this exhibition is Legacy: Photographs by Vanessa Bell and Patti Smith (until 4th June 2017) which features photographs by the famous musician, writer and artist, Patti Smith alongside albums belonging to Vanessa Ball. In 2003 Smith had a residency at Charleston and her comments reflect her interest in the works of the Bloomsbury Group.   – “Art was a part of everyday living. Their cups and saucers were designed by themselves, their utensils, the wallpaper, tapestries. When I first came here I found it just like home […] I felt a real longing to document this place in the same manner that I document my own home because it is very much how I live: books everywhere, things that seem very humble, very sacred, a simple wooden box, a shell, a paint tube – everything has significance.”

Patti Smith, Vanessa Bell’s Library, Duncan Grant’s painting of Vanessa Bell in her Mother’s Dress, 2006, Gelatin silver print, edition of 10, 25.4 × 20.32 cm, © Patti Smith. Courtesy the artist and Robert Miller Gallery

Patti Smith,
Vanessa Bell’s Library, Duncan Grant’s painting of Vanessa Bell in her Mother’s Dress, 2006,
Gelatin silver print, edition of 10, 25.4 × 20.32 cm,
© Patti Smith. Courtesy the artist and Robert Miller Gallery

http://www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk

Retreat and Rebellion

Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion, Two Temple Place, London WC2, until 23rd April 2017

Duncan Grant (1885 -1978) Bathers by the Pond,c1920-21 Oil on canvas, 49x 90cm, Pallant House Gallery (Hussey Bequest, Chichester District Council) © 1978 Estate of Duncan Grant, courtesy Henrietta Garnett / DACS 2016

Duncan Grant (1885 -1978)
Bathers by the Pond,c1920-21
Oil on canvas, 49x 90cm,
Pallant House Gallery (Hussey Bequest, Chichester District Council)
© 1978 Estate of Duncan Grant, courtesy Henrietta Garnett / DACS 2016

While to many of us the coast or countryside of Sussex appear idyllic places to live in the first half of the 20th century avant-garde artists and writers were drawn to live there.  Their communities were experimental whether artistically or domestically.

Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion 28th January –23rd April 2017 Two Temple Place, London WC2R 3BD All images courtesy of Two Temple Place and Rohan van Twest

Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion 28th January –23rd April 2017
Two Temple Place, London WC2R 3BD
All images courtesy of Two Temple Place and Rohan van Twest

At Charleston Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant not only painted but created interiors whose appeal lasts to the present day while at Ditchling Eric Gill and David Jones followed the arts and crafts tradition and at West Dean Edward James with Salvador Dali followed the Surrealist road (see my blog A Surreal Legacy, 07/12/2016).

David Jones (1895-1974) Madonna and Child in a Landscape, 1924 Oil on canvas, 61 x 61 cm, Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft © Trusteesof the David Jones estate. Image courtesy of Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft

David Jones (1895-1974)
Madonna and Child in a Landscape, 1924
Oil on canvas, 61 x 61 cm,
Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft
© Trusteesof the David Jones estate. Image courtesy of Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft

Add to this mix artists such as Edward Burra, Serge Chermayeff, Eric Ravilious, Henry Moore, John Piper, Lee Miller, Eileen Agar and Paul Nash and you will see how they individually reacted to their surroundings – some embracing and others more unsettled by them.

Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion 28th January –23rd April 2017 Two Temple Place, London WC2R 3BD All images courtesy of Two Temple Place and Rohan van Twest

Sussex Modernism: Retreat and Rebellion 28th January –23rd April 2017
Two Temple Place, London WC2R 3BD
All images courtesy of Two Temple Place and Rohan van Twest

The exhibition’s curator Dr Hope Wolfe summed it up saying: “The metropolis has long been assumed to be a catalyst for Modernism: a melting pot in which people from different places could meet, exchange ideas, and explore new ways of thinking and making. This exhibition asks what experimental artists, writers and makers of other kinds were doing in Sussex in the early twentieth century. For some, a rural retreat provided an opportunity for escape and alternative living. Enclaves were made of homes and communities, although works created in them are often suggestive of anxieties that accompanied attempts to break with convention. Others critiqued their new contexts, troubling the idea of Sussex as an idyll and sparking controversy with work created for local audiences. Comparing the lives and works of makers associated with different modernist movements, the exhibition illustrates how the regional setting both amplified their contrary energies and facilitated their attempts to live and represent the world differently. In turn, it shows how seemingly picturesque scenes were reimagined and transformed by the unsettled artist.”

 

 

Exhibition Opening Times: Monday, Thursday – Saturday: 10am – 4:30pm Wednesday Late: 10am – 9pm, Sunday: 11am – 4:30pm, Closed on Tuesday

www.twotempleplace.org

A gift from Brian Sewell

Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée Maternal Affection, 1773 Oil on copper 43.5 x 34.5 cm A gift from the Estate of Brian Sewell, 2016 © The National Gallery, London

Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée
Maternal Affection, 1773
Oil on copper
43.5 x 34.5 cm
A gift from the Estate of Brian Sewell, 2016
© The National Gallery, London

In a June 2012 interview in The Daily Telegraph the art critic Brian Sewell recalled that “As a child, there was not a major museum or art gallery in London I didn’t know, and the National Gallery was my favourite.” Indeed these were weekly visits and so it will not come as a surprise that he left a painting to the Gallery.

The painting Maternal Affection is by the French artist Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée (1724-1805) and is the only example of his work in a national collection.  There are eleven other examples of his oeuvre at Stourhead and the Bowes Museum. The style of this painting reflects Lagrenée’s admiration for 17th century Bolognese artists, especially Guido Reni.

 

The Gallery’s Curator of Post-1800 Paintings and acting Curator of 18th century French Painting, Christopher Riopelle sums the gift up saying: “The painting is a beautifully preserved oil on copper of exquisite refinement which allows the National Gallery for the first time to show the work of an artist who was hugely admired by the most discriminating connoisseurs and collectors of contemporary French art, both French and foreign, in the final decades of the 18th century.”

 

It hangs in Room 33 alongside the Gallery’s other 18th century French pictures.

 

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk

Battersea Spring

Affordable Art Fair – Battersea Spring, Battersea Evolution, London SW11, 9th – 12th March 2017

 

Peep Show II by Kevin Hendley. Oil on panel, 21 x 17cm. from Cameron Contemporary Art at the Affordable Art Fair Battersea.

Peep Show II by Kevin Hendley.
Oil on panel, 21 x 17cm.
from Cameron Contemporary Art at the Affordable Art Fair Battersea.

I am sure there is no need to tell you what a tempting mélange of artistic works in most disciplines awaits you at this Spring edition but I thought a gentle reminder may be welcome.

 

https://affordableartfair.com/fairs/battersea-spring

 

Antoni Tàpies

Antoni Tàpies: Revulsion and Desire, Timothy Taylor Gallery, 15 Carlos Place, London W1, until 18th March 2017

Antoni Tàpies - Installation View Photo: Sylvain Deleu Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

Antoni Tàpies – Installation View
Photo: Sylvain Deleu
Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

One can see why the Catalan artist Antoni Tàpies (1923–2012) exerted such an influence on Spanish art for more than sixty years. These works created since 2000 show that even in his later years he had lost none of his impact and reflect his 1955 observation: “If forms are not capable of wounding, irritating or inducing society to meditate, to make it realise how backward it is, if they are not a revulsive, then they are not authentic works of art.”

Antoni Tàpies - Installation View Photo: Sylvain Deleu Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

Antoni Tàpies – Installation View
Photo: Sylvain Deleu
Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

 

He used a mixture of materials in creating these abstract pieces, including sand, marble dust, chalk, dirt and human hair. The works on show very much suggest the body, especially Cames i AT, 2011 which hints at sexual congress while others have a hint of violence and confrontation His use of a cross-like motif evokes the idea of the ‘signature’ or mark of someone who cannot write and he also used numbers as well. They are works that leave a lasting impression on the viewer.

Antoni Tàpies - Installation View Photo: Sylvain Deleu Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

Antoni Tàpies – Installation View
Photo: Sylvain Deleu
Image Courtesy Timothy Taylor

http://www.timothytaylor.com