margaret-cooter: Drawing Tuesday

Last week the Drawing Tuesdays group met at Tate Modern, and one of the first things I saw when entering the building was this preparation area. Preparation for what, though, I wondered ... never mind, get on with the work ... So I settled down on the bench behind the glass and focussed....

On closing the sketchbook and looking around I noticed a man in a white shirt in the preparation area -

Yes, it was He, The Artist. It was amusing to see that a pair of women who happened to be passing also recognised Him - they were exchanging quiet smiles (we British are a restrained lot).

Some of the props in the preparation area reminded me a lot of the shadows in the 2016 performance in Rome, Triumphs and Laments (now a permanent mural), and the back of the Tate's turbine hall was blacked out for "a rehearsal", so I went to see what that might be about. There was a decent view from the mezzanine ...

Kentridge is very hands on -

The boxes open up into rooms, and an entire band occupies one of them at some point, if the snippet of the rehearsal that I saw was anything to go by.

Many languages are used in the production, with subtitles projected -

And yes, there are moving shadows -

It's a very ambitious work, and rehearsal time was short, according to this article, where you can also see a short video shot during rehearsal in New York (or catch on youtube).

The performance was 11-15 July; tickets were sold out for quite some time, and also for the talk he gave.

A second exciting event on the day was the RAF flypast of 100 planes - we got a front row seat at the riverside -

But back to the drawing..........

Janet B loves radios -

Najlaa enjoyed Robert Indiana's sculptures -

Joyce got involved in a textile piece -

... but didn't have red in her toolkit...

photographic rendition

Judith looked across the river -

and also at a Tony Cragg sculpture -

(here's the real thing, or rather a photo of it) -

Janet K engaged with Miro's Tightrope Walker -

I was drawn to the "trumpets" and to the perspectival possibilities of the chair -

Mags arrived late and hadn't settled to drawing (that rehearsal was a distraction!) but showed us some of the book in which she makes observations of exhibitions she's seen -