Apocalypse

No, don't worry not a particularly bad week, just the exhibition I went to see to round it off - the exhibition of the Victorian painter John Martin at Tate Britain. He painted the equivalent of literary potboilers. Huge fantasy canvases of the end of the world, or the destruction of Pompeii, or the fall of Babylon. Wonderful large detailed landscapes. And while imaginary he was also proud of his archaeological correctness, handing out leaflets to show how he had placed buildings correctly. Really very enjoyable stuff, even if his figure painting leaves something to be desired. Most humans seem to be keeling over as if leaning against driving wind. But seeing his paintings was a Victorian precursor to being able to go to the movies. Vast numbers of people would crowd to gaze on his works with dramatic lighting. Unfortunately I felt the exhibition was padded out a bit with his mezzotints, fine if different to the paintings, but why does one want to see small monochrome versions of huge colour paintings one has seen in the previous room?

I doubled up by seeing the other exhibition on at the Tate of Barry Flanagan.Now this is a modern artist I knew only from his bronzes of hares. This was entitled "His early works" and they include a lot of the sort of stuff that one takes the piss out of modern art for. Photography not allowed in the temporary exhibitions so I cannot illustrate my point, but if I say "Lights on sacks" was a pile of sacks leaning up against a corner with a light shining on them, well at least it wasn't a breach of the Trades Descriptions Act. But still very disappointing that it was exactly  what it said on the label. Two piles of hessian rugs even more so. Of course it comes with daft meaningless waffle such as "He explores his own response to materials, which he considered the the fundamental constituent of sculpture...A cloth sack is a two-dimensional piece of fabric that acts as a three-dimensional mould for the sand." (Or its a sandbag for non-pretentious wankers.)

The bronze hares are ok though.

Inspired by John Martin, whose fantasy landscapes were said to have inspired The likes of Ray Harryhausen in his backdrops to films such as Clash of the Titans, I went to see the film The Immortals. A truly awful film, strictly for those who like flashy bits of armour and muscular chaps wielding swords against classical backdrops. It takes the sort of big battle scenes that were done so well in the Lords of the Rings films and combines them with the weakest plot imaginable and negligible dialogue. There is only so much belief you can suspend, even in a fantasy.

But back at Tate Britain, always nice to potter round it for its breadth of art, and nice to see modern and traditional art all in one gallery rather than the tendency to have separate galleries for each. And it isa quite spectacular building. Will be interesting to see it when current refitting work is complete.

And there are some nice modern sculptures outside too.

 As well as the Chelsea school of Art next door, itself in quite an impressive set of buildings.

Other than that been a quiet week after return from Portugal. Sunday lunch with friends in Stratford, drinks after work Thursday and Friday with some of my younger mates (always a great pleasure) and I went to see Sarah Millican at the Apollo. Now one advantage of going to such things on my own is that you can just be lucky and get an odd perfect seat. And so I had for Ms Millican, 10 rows back (so avoiding being picked-on) but dead centre. It is often said that female comics are just not as funny as men. Well I had heard quite a lot of Sarah Millican on the radio so had high hopes of dispelling that theory. But dashed. Really rather weak material across the evening. And much of her charm just relies on that high-pitched Geordie accent. Best bit I recall was a reference to her mum offering sex education. "Just remember pet, you don't need to have anything in your mouth that you don't want to. But then she made me eat my broccoli. That's just double standards in my book."