It seems a long long time ago that we were in Venice enjoying the streets packed with tourists and the Aperols, ciccetti and pasta – not to mention the study in the wonderful libraries. My thoughts are with the people of Venice and hope to return as soon as possible. I most miss the amazing…
Category: Comment
Artweeeks 2020 Cancelled
Hi all. Not unexpectedly I have had to cancel the exhibition for Oxfordshire Artweeks Festival in May. I have filled my Online exhibition with a few images from last years exhibition. keep Safe, Gordon
Maha Rukab – Psalm 91
Cooped up in solitary confinement with a cough and sneezes. Bliss. The Galleries, Museums and libraries are all shut.Thought I might send out a few cheerful images over the next few days and weeks. This one from Psalm 91, one of the very beautiful bits of scripture.
“We’re all going to the Zoo…Dudley
Dudley Zoo. Yesterday our Warwick University ‘Thirties’ group visited Dudley Zoo (*Thirties meaning 1930s and not our ages!). The buildings spread around the site are known as Tectons and they represent a great example of thirties modernism, both in terms of art and social history. (The) Tecton Group was a radical architectural collaboration co-founded by…
Blake at the Tate Britain
Relevance is the key to great art. If painting is not relevant in its day then it is pointless. But when that relevance transgresses the ages it is even more valuable to us. William Blake is one of those greats whose message is as relevant today as it was 250 years ago. The Tate Britain…
Munich – The Lenbachhaus
Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider). I am never quite sure whether it is an art movement, a book, an exhibition or what. I do know that for a few short years before the First World War it represented a group of avant garde artists based in Bavaria, when Munich was the centre of the…
Florence and more Masaccios
Florence has so much renaissance art to offer the tourist. This morning we went to the Uffizi Gallery which must have more masterpieces per square metre than any other building I have ever been in… but more about that another time. The Santa Maria Del Carmine on the other side of the river was our…
Florence – Massacio’s Trinity
University staff have decided to go on strike so we have decided to skip Venice for a couple of days and see Florence. Have not been here for years because of all the low life but despite that you just have to stand in awe at the sites. Santa Maria Novella is first port of…
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
“Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink.” Immortal lines from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s great poem of 1834, which I enjoyed and still remember class reading at school. So with me flitting back and forth between Venice and North Gloucestershire floods, I thought an…
Torcello Cathedral
Torcello. If you ever come to Venice you will be bathed in some of the most sumptuous renaissance, baroque, modern and contemporary art imaginable. But if you leave without visiting Torcello you will not have properly treated your soul. Whichever myth of Venice and the visitations of the hun you are prepared to believe or…
