A Mike Leigh experience

I saw Mr Turner on Friday and enjoyed it very much. As ever, Mike Leigh gives you something to chew on. It's partly an examination of genius and how a fat grunting man could be one of the few world class painters that Britain ever produced and partly a celebration of the beauty and power of the natural world. I particularly enjoyed Turner's amusement at seeing work by the pre-Raphaelites for the first time.

The whole trip felt like an improvisation exercise with a film in the middle. Waiting on the stairs to go into the busy cinema, I got caught in the crossfire of some braying middle class people and their too-loud talk of holidays, retirement and what terrific culture vultures they were.  At the end of the film, one of the womem sitting along from me told everybody how overlong, tedious and pointless she thought the film was. I thought I had let the crowd clear before leaving, but again got stuck on the stairs. And who was behind me but my mouthy friends? I managed to shut out the matter of their discussion.

Weasels, painting, walking

I'm currently enjoying The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, which manages to get some reasonably serious musings on our globalised world and why people work in it. I was thinking about Alain de B's photo essay on tuna fish and the interconnectedness of our world while drinking weasel coffee at work. Myself and two colleagues chipped in to buy it. So, in short, small Vietnamese mammals vomitted so that some statisticians in Midlothian could muck about and avoid finishing that analysis plan.

I actually bought the book for quite another reason, as I know the painter profiled in it. It seems a fair write up, and it's good to see an intelligent commentary on painting.

And rather oddly I know somebody else who has a book out. Step forward Craig, whose book The Weekend Fix is being published by Sandstone Press. It's based on his hillwalking experiences. I don't figure by name apparently, but I may be some kind of presiding spirit.

How big is it really?

Check out ActualSizer. It gives you a sense of the scale of an art work: something that is often lost in reproduction. I sense some major time-wasting approaching.

Steven Campbell

I'm taking advantage of my half-idleness just now to go to lunchtime talks. Today we looked back on the work of the painter Steven Campbell, who died last year. The talk was significant for me as he was one of a remarkable generation at Glasgow School of Art in the early 80s who were held up as an example when I was at school. He was in the same year as Ken Currie, who won the annual Newberry award. Since Steven was also clearly exceptional, they invented the Bram Stoker award for him. These and other figures meant that when learning about art in the 80s, I had some local examples that gave me a connection to new developments in painting. As a result I never questioned that figurative painting was worthwhile, and am probably still working out of an enthusiasm born at that time. Scotland in the 80s could be a right miserable place, so some genuine heroes (mostly working class too) went down very well.

To be honest, I've never been a completely consistent fan of Campbell's work - it often seemed overblown and a little pretentious. Today's talk did address this somewhat: he was more versatile and thoughtful than I probably gave him credit for. Now what we need is a proper retrospective.

Rudolph knew his pictures

During my visit to Prague in December, I learned about Rudolph II and his famous collection of paintings. I'd only vaguely been aware of this before, but learned a lot during my visit to Prague castle, where they are trying to reunite as many of Rudolph's paintings as they can. This is a big task, as they have been scattered by such forces as: bickering relatives, disgruntled Swedish armies who need to get some looting in before peace breaks out, and objects ending up in different countries when an empire breaks down.

I'm now going to see references to the man everywhere. Last week Melvyn Bragg did a program about Rudolph's court. Yesterday I went to a show in the Queen's Gallery in Holyrood Palace, and what should be there but Breugel's Massacre of the Innocents. It was part of the royal collection in Prague, where R had the dying children painted out and replaced by animals and bundles. Charles II later bought it. Him and his dad were responsible for a lot of the good gear in the royal collection.

Today's art

I expected to like the current exhibition of Carol Rhodes' work at the Modern Art Gallery, after leafing through the accompanying book. However, this is an example where reproduction is very kind to the work. I expected large monumental landscapes, but they were quite small, looking rather forlorn in the large rooms. They also strike me as lazy and dull, combining a number of pretentious features: the lack of frames, the deliberate "naivety", and an ironic distance from the subject. At their best, there is an echo of Edward Hopper, but only just.

Never mind. It was free and the cafe downstairs is excellent.

A dose of art

I should be more grateful for living in Edinburgh. There aren't too many places where you can pop out on a whim to see some Turner watercolours. These are part of the permanent collection of the National Gallery, but are only show in January when it's dim. Mr Vaughan was very kind to do this, but he obviously never realised that the light in a gallery could be artificially controlled.

I like the way the Portrait Gallery always has some wee exhibitions in the gaps between the headliners. In particular the quirky things they put on next to the cafe are always a delight. They currently have some portraits generated from death masks in an Edinburgh collection. The results are eerie, beautiful "photographs" of people who, in most cases, died before the invention of photography.

Joan Eardley

I expected to like the Eardley show that is currently on at the NGS, and this can be a prelude to disappointment. Luckily, this was not the case, as it is excellent.

I was quite carried away by a roomful of paintings of children from Townhead. It never really occurred to me that they encapsulate an era that was almost over. Townhead was mostly demolished to build the M8. JE's paintings are now a record of a world where children played in the streets and seemed to have a sense of togetherness that you'd be hard pushed to find these days. The children would all be about 60 now.

Good to see

There's a nice exhibition of Alasdair Grey's work in Cafe Cossachok in Glasgow. Great to see some original versions of book covers, and some very early work from the 50s. It's just a shame that somebody of this status has a retrospective in the downstairs room of a restaurant (albeit a very nice one).

A quick visit too, because it's only on till Saturday, and I only found out on Tuesday, and I'm busy.

More please, but organise better next time.

Art

I manged to get to some of the main art exhibitions for the festival today.

I'll write some more about some of the big shows later, but some of the wee ones are cool too. Maybe it's just because you start without any expectations, but the small groups of work in single rooms are often excellent.

Among its blockbusters, the NGS have got together some prints by William Blake, and very fine they are too. In passing, I wonder if anybody has done a critique of, say, Songs of Innocence that considers both the word and the image? Those literary types shouldn't think they've annexed the topic.

The portrait gallery has a lovely selection of pastel portraits next to the cafe. What else can I say - they are exquisite and beautiful things.

The Queen has also done us proud and put on Amazing Rare Things at the gallery in Holyrood. (I suppose it's not a small show, but hey, I'm on a roll.) This is of natural history illustrations, whether part of Leonardo da Vinci's studies in red chalk, or a rich cardinal's cabinet of curiosities. The lack of an aesthetic party line or agenda about 'Art' is very refreshing. I noticed both here and in previous extracts from the royal collection, that HMQ has a lot to thank some of her predecessors for. George III in particular seems to have had an excellent eye (or been very well advised). I doubt the current members are enhancing the collection much.

Art in the rain

It's a wet Saturday in August and I'm trying to get round some of the exhibitions that are on for the Festival. This is only partly successful, as everybody else is trying to do the same. In the Portrait Gallery Ricky Demarco is working the crowd at an exhibition covering his work with Edinburgh Festivals past.

In the city Art Centre I admire Joyce Cairns' painting Shoes from Majdanek, which shows a huge pile of shoes discarded by the victims of a concentration camp. Some other visitors take a shine to it, thinking it's rather fun "That's a lovely idea, lots of shoes. Lovely colours!" Should I tell them? But what do you say? No, it's not fun, it's a searingly painful reminder of the Holocaust?

Eventually I get wet feet and go home to watch DVDs.

Stick to the painting

I've just heard Howard Hodgkin interviewed on Front Row. He sounded a miserable old sod.

War art

A couple of exhibitions recently have pointed me to the work of Edward Baird (1904-1949), a little-known painter from Montrose. When I visited Kelvingrove last, I found his Unidentified aircraft, which feels as strong in its way as any of the images in the Imperial War Museum. He also had some work in the recent exhibition of works from the McManus in Dundee: a fine portrait of his father in law playing chess with ghostly pieces. Neither of these can be found on the web, so you'll have to take my word for it. He suffered from ill health and died fairly young, before he could complete much of what he was obviously capable.

My musings on Baird came from visiting the Dean and Modern Art galleries yesterday. They have quite a nice show of graphic work from WW I in a corridor, with German on one wall and British on the opposite wall. Odd how the German work looks much stronger (Otto Dix, Max Beckmann) that the victors. Is this just because we've been trained to see it in terms of the original work that these artists later did? Whereas Augustus John's stock has rather diminished, and who now would want to look at his rather limp and unfocussed image? The work by Eric Kennington still looks good, though he could be illustrating anything.

Motivation

I should be painting, but it's hard getting started. Which is why I'm writing pointless blog entries and drinking too much coffee. Despite enjoying painting once I get started, and knowing that I do, I do far too little of it. Maybe if I had an assisstant to set everything up and wash brushes it would help. Having a routine would help. In as much as I have one, it seems to be from 9-11 in the evening, which can be a surprisingly productive time. This does mean that painting in the afternoon sometimes just feels wrong.

One's pictures

Saw a nice exhibition of Canalettos at the Queen's Gallery yesterday. Very interesting to see how contrived and altered the images from this famously "detailed" artist are. Perspective is used as a distraction. The collection has a matching set of 12 paintings that trace the Grand Canal through Venice. George III bought them from the wealthy patron who commissioned them, showing that he had some taste (or he was well advised). The present royals have precious little of this, as becomes clear when you see the awful tat on sale in the gallery shop.

Nice show

After a couple of fairly miserable weekends, today was officially a nice crisp autumn day. Just the occasion for a spontaneous cross-town walk to the Dean gallery, there to see Consider the Lilies, a selection of paintings from the McManus galleries in Dundee. The galleries are getting a makeover at the moment, and Edinburgh (and later, London) are the beneficiaries.

For once, I get the timing right and have a pleasant experience, as it's not too busy and I can have scones and coffee first without screaming children who are being dragged round by their earnest parents. The show itself is excellent and makes me ashamed never to have visited the McManus. After it re-opens, I should go. The work does play to my personal likes, having a lot of strong figurative work from 1910 to 1940, with none of that suspect continental what-do-you-call-it?, cubo-futurism or something. Whatever that bloke Picasso does, anyway. Many artists are unknown, or half known, and as so often, the lesson is that there are many more good painters around that our collective canon of "good art" can contain. David Foggie and John Maclauclan Milne are entirely new to me. Hugely impressive too is James Gunn's portrait of his wife, as flashy as a Sargent, but painted with genuine affection and observation - her gorgeous Paris clothes a study in themselves.

Also a fine selection of etchings by Ian Fleming (no, not that one) on display downstairs.

All in all, a suitable prelude to my own efforts this afternoon.

Arty stuff

Just had my first OCA tutorial for the present course. It went better than I feared and cheered me up quite a bit. The venue was a nicely bohemian studio in Leith, a milieu I have benn unaccustomed to of late. I got paint on my hands and everything.

Portraits

Went to see the winners of the BP Portrait Awards today. I actually already had a look at them a couple of weeks ago, but something made me go back. My initial impression had been a very pleasant one, but at a second look, it seemed more mixed. The initial surprise (or is it?) is that there is a lot of very detailed, precise, and--for want of a better word--traditional work here. However, there's a lot of rather facile stuff too. A good few pieces seem to be developed using large scale photographs (not in itself a fault), but have added little by the process of painting. My overall criticism is that they're too bland, and too afraid of being paintings. The winner, in particular, would be as effective as a photo; if there's been any imaginative transformation here, it's well hidden.

Works I do like:
Monkey Painting - I missed the monkey first time round
Portrait of Chantal Menard - Old fashioned in technique, but of a pierced and tattooed babe
Gran Turismo is a great image, but why paint it?
Anna and Kiki is quirky, and that's good
Older passed me by the first time, but is great
Wife and Daughter is a very sweet portrait, and reminds me that not all the pieces here work as portraits.

I am experienced in the use of wooden tripods

Went to a painting class last night. I was asked at the start if I had used an easel before. An odd question. Are you now required to view a health and safety video first or something?
Quite fun in the end, but acrylics are a bit yuck. It might help if I took some decent brushes.

Isn't oil paint gorgeous?

After quite a long dry patch, I finally did some painting last night. As ever, it was awkward getting started, but once the smell of turps is in your nostrils, you're on a roll. The usual gripes were felt: "I don't have enough brushes" (actually, I have loads); "I wish I didn't have to wash the brushes afterwards". The subject was a copy of a Peter Howson head that I started a while back. It's looking a lot better now. I really need to get into a regular painting habit again. A routine can be a very helpful thing.