Old Masters, New Exhibits

London, October 2016

The city of London never gets old, especially when it comes to exhibitions.  With every visit, something new is to be seen - the race to 'see everything' never ends in galleries that seem to change their clothes with every passing weekend.  The art-lover can never keep up!  A feast for the eyes, a buffet for the soul, London always excites and never disappoints when it comes to art. 

What other way to spend a Saturday, then, strolling in and between the latest exhibits? My ambitions (and to-do lists) are great, but I usually manage only to get to two in a day.  Last Saturday, I visited Dulwich Picture Gallery for the first time.  I highly recommend, especially on a fine autumnal day such as it was, catching the Overground from Victoria to the captial's little village outpost.  The twelve minute ride sets you off walking down blissfully green tree-lined streets, crossing through wide parks and sports-pitches, to the gallery seemingly nestled away from the world.

 Inside, a fantastic collection of the Dutch master Andriaen van de Velde awaited (sorry, no pictures allowed!).  An impressive series of landscapes opened, and remained the focus, of the show - lovely scenic blue skies, arched billows of cloud and lush greenery set the palette for the rural, frugal abundance that was the main subject of van de Velde's work.  His sense of detail was marvellous.  His devotion to each and every minute figure, a washing woman, a dashing dog, begged for your own devoted viewership.  This became further evidenced by drawings exhibited alongside major works of the master.  As someone whose main primary source is the drawings of the artist, I truly appreciated how they surrounded a major painting with its various stages in pen and ink and chalk. Not only was one continuously impressed with his attention to the most minute figural detail, but also with his concern for the coordination of those figures within the wider compositional harmony of the respective work.  I believe this was a unique aspect of the exhibition that should be repeated in future with other artists.  These final works in paint can then be viewed in light of the creative enterprise behind them, and the drawings, not a stand alone relic for itself, but the intimate manoeuvres of mind and hand as the artist works towards greater and broader concepts.  

After the focused walk through the exhibit, I spent a while wandering the gallery itself.  I loved its size and relative intimacy;  its use of rich, evocative wall colouring and layered hanging arrangement set viewer and artworks in a context where each played off of one another - artwork on artwork, viewer on artwork - in such a way that there was a certain freedom in viewing them as a whole or as a selected favourite.  

There was also a lovely children's art activity event ongoing. As a regular frequenter of such events in my home-schooled days, I really appreciated seeing them all at work on art surrounded by art.  My favourite form of learning - education in situ! 

The best way to finish a full morning at an exhibition - cake at the gallery cafe! The caffeine and sugar is always the best sustenance to help you press on to your next stop. 

Another walk through the Dulwich parks, and a train back to Victoria.  The city was alive, bustling and sunshiney, so a walk to Trafalgar was in order.  I always forget how big the buildings are from below, glassy fronts glinting against the blue sky above (Admittedly, I suddenly felt transported to the city in the new Star Trek movie...wondering if this is where they got their inspiration from...).  

London...in space?

Although the sun was lovely, I was feeling the day slipping away fast so my pace across town was quick.  Fortunately, I managed to slip in to the 4pm viewing slot of the newly-opened Beyond Caravaggio exhibit at the National Gallery that, above all things that, I wanted to see.

The exhibit was, appropriately, full.  In each room, at least one Caravaggio hung, a monument to gasp and gape at among works of contemporaries and followers.  Displayed in such a way (much like the Delacroix exhibit I had seen last year, which I also adored),  his true genius (controversial word - but I am using it!) was something to be worshipped, from his younger to his more mature works.  His Judas Kiss was incredible - the exhausted Christ submitted, enveloped, by the brutal metal arm of the shoulder that crushed into the space of the viewer.  In their beautifully handled tenebrism, the figures illuminated rich black canvases like candles, filling the spaces as they tumbled out of it before you.  My eyes begged to touch the skin of St, John the Baptist in the wilderness, of the grapes and peaches tumbled across tables. He painted as if to tempt, breaking down the third wall of the canvas in a seduction of your senses that was only ever just out of your reach.  Standing before them, I was taken back to the streets and cathedrals of Rome I had wandered and loved years ago; my passion for his altarpieces in situ rekindled and experienced again on the faraway isle of England.   

Unfortunately, the 'temptation' to more fully experience them was heightened by what I felt to be lighting that was too intense, not only on the Caravaggios but on the other darkly beautiful works framing them.  In this instance, the crowds not only had the trouble of negotiating each other, but a spotlight which blurred, distorted and obscured parts of the image, sometimes even the central or focal point.  I found myself slipping to the side or standing to the back of the group (on my tip-toes), trying to look up at the pictures at an angle so view it without that central gold 'splotch' of the spotlight.  I am no gallery or lighting expert, but would not the dimmer lighting, like that of a cathedral, be more suitable for works that themselves were meant to glow forth from the darkness of their canvases, from the shadows of a chapel?  (Please comment...I would be interested in your thoughts on this matter of display...).

Nevertheless, I felt myself more than pleased by National Gallery exhibit - not only did I thoroughly enjoy the Caravaggio's I had seen in Baroque art history books come to life before me, but I loved seeing different work of the period that I had never seen before. The drama of darkness and light, in colour as in the stories of artists and their subjects themselves, will never cease to entice my love of mystery.  It is works like these, though not of my period of specialisation, and the galleries that house them that continue to call me back to London, her exhibits, and my love and study of art.  

Postcards of a few of my favourite now hanging above my desk: (L) Nicolas Regnier, St. Sebastian tended by the Holy Irene and her Servant ; (R) Caravaggio's St. John