Can we every have too much art? ... possibly yes, when it's all in one place... eg the London Art Fair. In my four-hour visit I saw too much to absorb - yet much of it was rather ignorable, either gimmicky or samey or seen last year. If you browse in the gallery list on the website, clicking through to the images, you can get the same effect without going to the bother of being there.
It was a surprise to see, among the modernity, a 15th-century German carving - an "Anna Selbsdritt" to add to my collection -
Also surprising, among the many Ivon Hitchins landscapes on show and for sale was an interior with figures -
Work by Julie Airey appeared light and calm from a distance, and up close revealed the importance of a few lines of stitching, being "acrylic and embroidery on muslin" -
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| Detail; painted muslin layer is stitched onto painted background |
A pair of tall thin pieces by Gordon Baldwin got me thinking ahead to making "chimneypots" -
Discovery of the day was the altered book pages by Carolyn Thompson, with revisions sewn on with hair -
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| Detail of Shakespeare's Sonnet 130, altered |
Do have a read of this one on her website, which was also on show.
Many other artworks that caught the camera's eye, these among them -
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| Harriet Mena Hill |
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| Sandra Blow - "acrylic and tea on ticking" |
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| Katherine Jones |
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| Leo Davy - the texture of the white echoes the shapes of the colour below |
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| Marcelle Hanselaar |
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| Tricia Gillman's "Memory Strings" |
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| Lucy Jones, Reflections |
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| Takefumi Hori's gold and silver leaf brought Dorothy Caldwell's work to mind |
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| Claudia Carr, Col de Fornia, 2016 |
One of the first and last things I saw was this large painting with its sculptural elements -
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| Marcus Harvey, Sailing By, 2016 "Acrylic, jesmonite on inkjet on canvas" |
The "crashing boar" incident was not exactly my favourite part of the day - enthused by seeing the work of Sarah Gillespie, I stepped back and was "attacked" by a knee-height bronze boar innocently standing in the middle of the gallery space. I managed not to fall onto his spiny back, but the tip of his tail caught me on the way down. I got off lightly and could walk away without hobbling. Fortunately the skirt I was wearing is made of invincible fabric and only a little mark was visible. Under it, though, as I found out at home, the slip and tights suffered huge holes, and my thigh has a 3" surface gash and a lovely bruise is developing. So embarrassing, but it could have been so much worse!
To end, a mystery -
These works by Susan Hefuna are described as "pencil and thread on tracing paper" - but they look more like white ink and red paint on tracing paper ... maybe the pencil and thread are underneath?
4 comments:
Thanks for reminding me of Hefuna's work which I much admire, and which I've not looked at for a while now. On her website the four pieces said to be of pencil and thread are actually watercolour on tracing paper. I do like that waxy translucency of the tracing paper.
Horrid boar! I know how easy it is to step back from looking at a piece on the wall to find a sculpture lurking ready to pounce!
Very many thanks for reminding me of the work of Gordon Baldwin (as well as introducing me to so much else). I first met Baldwin's beautiful irregularly-rimmed bowls in the Sainsbury Centre for the visual arts at the University of East Anglia in Norwich. I intended at the time to look further into his work but was on a long trip and on my return home life crowded in and the research somehow never got done. Now I have the time and can extend the pleasure. Thank you!
No picture of the attaching boar? I hope your leg is ok.
Thank you for sharing this. I discovered several favorite new artists here, particularly Tricia Gillman. I always learn so much from your outings.
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