A walk in the woods and Butser Iron Age Village

Finally managed to find a weekend to visit my old friend Neil down in Sussex. He and I went off to walk the dog on a long walk, not sure if Neil was exercising me or the golden retriever! But it was really nice shady walk through the Sussex countryside with the prospect of a pint or two and a burger at the end.

A Victorian bathing pool, Neil assured me

Bonnie needed a good drink after all that. I settled for a pale ale

Dinner was barbecue on a balmy sunny evening with the family. You really couldn't ask for more to unwind, with a comedy film to finish.

Next morning I suggested a visit to Butser iron age village, given my love of archaeology. This is a living museum, so there are some volunteers doing some reenactment stuff. None of the buildings are genuine - they are all recreations based on archaeological evidence, but with a bit of speculation thrown in. It is quite a compact site, but the whole thing is very well done. Would appeal to children and adults

So the huts start with the stone age. Basically a tent, a shelter with skins 

Moving from Mesolithic to Neolithic, a rather more permanent house, with a massive weight of reed thatch forming effectively roof and walls

In teh middle an impressive herd of primitive goats

When two horns are just not enough....

Bonnie didn't like the look of all those horns!

Then you pass into the iron age village with its roundhouses

This is interesting in that it is a hut you can't get into as it is sort of falling down. All this is experimental archaeology, so this just tests how long one of these houses would last. As you can see, the wall  is buckling

From the iron age roundhouses of the Brits one moves to a little Roman villa. A definite step up in class

And finally to Anglo-Saxon dwellings with an interesting array of reproduction weapons and artefacts. Because everything is a reproduction, you can walk on the mosaics, feel the clothes and handle the armour at will. The shields are heavy, but the helmets are mighty heavy. As is the chain mail.

Yes of course I had to have a go...

 

Tate Britain and Modern

So my friend Clarissa decided to buy plus one membership of the Tate allowing us to go to both Tate Britain and Tate Modern exhibitions (and their respective members' rooms). Primary exhibition to see at Tate Britain was the Gainsborough exhibition. But it wasn't on. Closer examination of the poster showed it was indeed opening 20 May, but May 2027, not 2026!

However there was a Whistler retrospective which was very good. I hadn't realised how well travelled the man was

This one was in Brittany

Old Westminster Bridge

His most famous work by far, Whistler's Mother

His Peacock Room recreated

The vast open hallway in Tate Britain has the most random stuff in it - see below

And just because it was on, and we had membership, we went to the other exhibition at the gallery by a British artist of whom I had never heard before, Hurvin Anderson. Nor you? I can tell you why. He is rubbish. Described as "intensely colourful work" which is the label you might put on a primary school painter, but for all the blurb on his paintings in the show the blindingly obvious point about his subject matter is that the big blocks of colour are simple and hide his inability to paint stuff. Especially faces. Many of which he just represented by a big brown circle. The only paintings we liked are his slightly amorphous flower garden ones

The members room up in the dome is nice though

Clarissa had never been to St Dunstans in the East before, so we went there. For once no one taking wedding photos

I will leave you to judge who is the more photogenic out of Clarissa and I

Then a walk up through the City to a Hong Kong restaurant beyond Brick Lane

To finish up after lunch at Tate Modern. Clarissa wanted a rest after criss-crossing the City so we we stated with the members' room. Nice views across the Thames

Although the terrace doesn't have much space

Now the main exhibition Clarissa wanted to see here was the Fria Kahlo. And would you believe that also isn't on yet - opening next month? So not a great return for her membership.

But what was on was an exhibition of the works of Tracey Emin. Now if I was scathing about Hurvin Anderson's schoolkid daubings, Tracey Emin makes him look like Leonardo Michelangelo and Rembrandt rolled into one. Even more obviously, she has no artistic ability at  all. She either just daubs slogans (she can write legibly in block capitals, although very limited vocabulary - mostly just swear words), draws what are just about, and only just about, recognisable as humans, creates sculptures -  generally very small and looking like they might have been of something but were left too close to a fire and have melted, videos of herself being very inarticulate, or things like the famous unmade bed, which are basically just mounds of rubbish you would chide your idle teenager for having left.  

Honestly it is beyond satirising. But if you were absolutely useless at drawing, painting or sculpting and went to art school, this is probably what you would produce. If you didn't try.

One of the more interesting artworks in the general collection

And then we settled into the members area again to await meeting up with friends for drinks and dinner