Going to Gauguin

To Tate Modern on Sunday (for the first time (I think) since moving to London, shocking) to see the Gauguin exhibition on there. Here comes the reflective bit...

He's a painter I knew nothing about at all really, despite knowing the name. Lots of famous artists and the like you seem to learn bits about through osmosis but Gauguin I had never really heard anything about. But I learnt he lived in Tahiti, was a bit of a rebel and painted some interesting art.

One thing I did note in the crowded exhibition halls (too many people!) were the few yummy mummies attempting to teach their gaggle of children aged 4-8 about the works of a painter they neither know or care about. As my good friend Severs once blogged, it comes across more as the mother showing off to those in ear shot what shes knows than a genuine desire to teach children about Gauguin (Gauguin!).

If I'm wrong in their intentions, while it's admirable to have such lofty educational ambitions for your children it's surely a bit too much, too young, and certainly too public. The Tate Modern is a great building though, isn't it? I enjoyed going to the seventh floor for the views over the entirety of the immediate north side of the river and beyond – and all for free.

Also, is this weather marking the official end of summer? You always seem to get days like this in October that cast a few final rays of sun and heat across the nation before the plunging despair and black dog of winter draws in night by night, stalking across the land.

It'll be Christmas Day before you know it.

Surgically...

Dan Brown is back (and this time he's personal). I read the Da Vinci Code (The answer was Paris, or Jesus, or birth. I forget) many years ago when it first came out because after a scathing, withering put-down of the book by my Dad (which included the family-famous line of 'Up yours ratso!') I felt compelled to read it. Funny how recommendations work isn't it?

Books. They've become massive again, to the point where that isn't even an issue. Harry Potter and Dan Brown - two insufferable people who have changed the face of publishing, in some ways. I can't stand HP and I'll happily never read another DB book. I've always wanted to watch the Da Vinci movie though after I heard that, apparently, during the press screening all the critics laughed at the line "Quick, to a library!" Who couldn't?

I am off to the Tate Britain in a moment where perhaps I will encounter a dying curator with a strange, cryptic message on the floor beside him and a beautiful yet highly talented female cryptologist will enter the room and together we'll decipher a series of yadda yadda yadda...

Picture perfect

The quality of mobile phone cameras continues to astound me. These were two images taken from my phone while at home, and the sheer level of detail, and size of the images, is just incredible. And my camera is hardly top of the range. The days of needing both a digital camera and a phone are surely coming to and end?


























Aside from that, isn't Cornwall spectacular?

Look at me

One of the scariest Dr Who episodes is, apparently, Blink. I've not seen it but I know that the plot involves statues that attack people by moving towards them if the person doesn't look at them. The idea of living statues must have influenced Anthony Gormley for the fantastic living plinth art installation. I think it's a great idea. It has generated much discussion and because every hour is different there is potentially always something interesting, different and noteworthy taking place.

Not only that, but for those of us who lucky enough / unlucky enough (delete as to your opinion) to live in London, it really is the case that if you find yourself in the vicinity of Trafalgar Square you can pop round and see what's going on. I love the lions in the Square, but I don't detour to go and see them anymore much like the way I use Big Ben as a time keeping device first, a fantastic London landmark second. Because it's ever changing there is always a reason to wander over and have a look.

It's also very much of its time but timeless too (I hope that doesn't sound pretentious). All art is made by people, inspired by events, a reaction to things that have happened, or are to happen, so to place people on the plinth, campaigning for certain things, dancing, playing music, or just standing there admiring the scenery, is at the heart of all art.

But on the flip side, in the world of Youtube and Facebook and Twitter, where everyone is pontificating and sounding off or telling you what they had for breakfast, and uploading videos and photos (often of what they had for breakfast), it's tapping in to this new age of creativity and self-expression. What's also pleasing to note is, thus far, no-one has (as far as I am aware) had eggs or anything hurled at them. Which you could expect to be the case.

I've applied to go on, and hope I get it. Just not at 3am on Sunday night in the pouring rain.

Hidden messages

Quick link - some brilliant examples of hidden and/or subtle messages within companies logos and the power of graphic design. I've never seen the arrow in the FedEx logo before (find it right) or the bear on Toblerone.

Finishing touches

I've just noticed how image light the top of my blog is; it looks a touch drab. I don't want to go OTT but something for the banner on which the text could rest would be good. Any suggestions?

An Icelandic horse

For work I regularly have to make use of copy right free images - perhaps from dedicated sites like Morgue File (a staple of university days) - or be perusing the various terms on Wikipedia and Flickr images to see if they are free to use. Being a small company it's important to be judicious with funds you see.


What I like about this is three things:

One - that people are willing to be so open with their images. They take them and uploaded them purely because they will of interest, benefit and use to millions of people around the world. Often in ways they couldn't imagine.

Two - how many talented people there are out there. Some of the photos you come across are truly fantastic, and yet they are in all probability taken by a keen amateur photographer who is happy enough to see the image online.

Three - the best reason though is just the fact you can come across some fantastic, striking and beautiful images completely at random. Earlier today I was looking for an image of Iceland. I found this one, which is a beautiful shot and will be the one we use, but I also came across this (the image above), which is also a wonderful shot and finding it through such a roundabout way makes it all the more enjoyable.

Pea Diddy

Those with a penchant for puns will no doubt remember the fun we all had on Comic Relief day when @serafinowicz set up a 'vegtable pun game' and asked people to contribute a small donation in return for entry to the competition of having their winning entry painted. That was a long sentence.

The winning entry was The Notorious V.E.G. and on Mr S's new, fancy website he's put the winning image up. It's AMAzing, and done by the clearly supremely talented Jim Vance. I just wanted to share it.

More Reading

The Plot Against America: Phillip Roth. A dark, brooding ominous book that considers what could have happened if Charles Lindburgh had become president in 1940 - given some of the openly anti-semetic statements he had been making in the months leading up the election and the rumours he was to stand for Republican party nomination. Told through the eyes of Roth himself, in that alternative past, as a nine-year-old, who watches as his family, and their world, is torn apart by the slow, creeping anti-semitism that broods in the country, as America refuses to become involved in Europe's war. The only disappointment was the ending felt very rushed and didn't seem to chime with the scene that had been set through 300 pages before; but it didn't ruin the book in anyway.

Black Swan Green: David Mitchell. A fabulous, dream-like work that charts 13 months in the life of an introverted 13-year-old schoolboy in 1980s Britain, who stammers and writes poetry, while trying to avoid these two things being discovered. All very coming-of-age but utterly beguiling, especially seeing how his opinions change from child to young-adult.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: Hunter S. Thompson. Weird city man. Certainly different and one to say you've read, but is it great? I wasn't convinced that it was that great, but did enjoy its weird, tripped out style and the rash bravado of the central characters. The fact it's something of a semi-autobiographical piece of work makes it feel a more complete, purposeful work. But who am I to pass opinion on Hunter S Thompson?

Mortal Engines: Phillip Reeve. Okay this is technically a children's book - well it is, full stop a children's book, - but like Dark Materials or Harry Potter, it has an element that 'adults' can appreciate. A swash-buckling adventure story set in the future where cities move around and 'eat' smaller cities, to harvest them for materials and so forth. Lots of in-jokes for adults too - CDs being considered high-tech and spelt seedys. But it was just a children's book. What? After The Plot Against America I wanted something light. Jeez.

A Confederacy of Dunces: John Kennedy Toole. Intriguing background to this. The author killed himself because he couldn't get it published. Then his mother found it, championed it and it finally found its fame - winning the Pulitzer Prize in 1981 - 12 years after the author was dead. His frustration was, sort of, justified, as it's a fantastic, rambling, bizarre book, with one of the most outrageous lead characters ever put to page - Ignatius J. Reilly - and full of great comic turns to drive the plot. A plot that never explains itself to the reader, but trusts you to stick with it, as numerous side stories are brought in, that career into the main story, tearing off in their own direction before everything starts to converge together, in the most spectacular fashion, towards the end.

Signposting

If something good happens - look for the symbol of the hands clapping.


If it's something bad - look for the...skull and cross bones? Coffin?

All I want for Christmas

There's a growing trend on Amazon for people to write ridiculously glowing reviews of the most inane and asinine objects and the ones on this photo of Paul Ross are absolutely brilliant.

But one thing I want to know is why on earth is there the opportunity, even in our highly capitalist world, to buy a photograph of Paul Ross for 50 quid?

A novel idea

I took part in this year's National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo to give it its Japenese sounding name, and am pleased to report I scraped in with 50,300 words by the 29th of November - around 220 pages.

The ethos is very much to write quantity, not worry about the quality, but then to go back and edit, re-edit, draft, re-write and polish the chunk of text you have to work on (you can't edit a blank page), rather than merely saying you're going to write a book but never actually do. Needless to say I do not feel my book is anywhere near close to anything resembling publishable, however, maybe after much editing and drafting it will be, who knows.

It was a fun challenge though, and the positive message of the website through which it is run - essentially, just write and write but don't stop and don't worry about quality or anything like that - does really help you stop being self-critical and just keep getting the words down on the page - 1,666 a day to be precise.

I'd recommened it to anyone who has also wondered about / wanted to write a novel, but perhaps the only problem is now you'll have to wait a whole year to do it...

I Told You So

As I mentioned a few posts previous I recently took part in Someone Once Told Me, and now my image has been updated. You can click here to see it on the site, or just look a few millimeters to the right. There's even a little audio description of what my 'SOTM' is about.

The owner of the site is always happy for people to take their own and send it to him so why not? What inspirational (or comedic) words would you choose?

Words of wisdom

The internet is great for many reasons. Chief among these is the way it brings people together through the most random of routes and for such interesting reasons.

On Saturday I took part in photo-wisdom website 'Someone Once Told Me' because the owner of the site had used his Google Analytics to track the link I had given him on this blog. He asked if I would like to take part and so I accepted and myself, and my housemate, went along to meet him.

We wrote our words and had our photos taken, chatted about the site, his future plans for it, why it's such an enjoyable site to peruse and so on, and it was all very pleasant. And really we had the internet to thank for bringing us all together on a cold and rainy day in North London when otherwise we would have probably just sat around doing nowt.

If you want to take part in the project you can contact Mario (for it is he) at the bottom of this page. Alternatively he says he is more than happy for people to send in their photos for submission.

I'll upload my picture once it's live.

Art underground

Poems on the Underground is a great idea but I've often felt the poems chosen were a bit random and too often don't have any connection with London, or travelling, or things relating to the context in which they are placed.

This one though that I saw last night on't Northern Line is fantastic.

Tasteless

The ad tagline here is tasteless anyway, but the placing it here in Stockwell is particularly poor.

Credit to thelondonunderground blog for publishing this first - a very interesting blog for anyone based in the Londoninium area, or Londo, if Boris gets his way, apparently.

Topical

A great Google variation.

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

What, in the name of sanity, has Kate Moss done to deserve having £1.5m spent on making a gold statue of her? As far as I am aware she doesn’t have a discernable talent apart from ‘looking pretty’. Essentially she’s done all check-list of pointless celebrity things – clothing range, music video, some charity fundraising – although PETA have criticised her for continually wearing fur – and she’s dated some other famous people.

If Moss is a charitable soul then surely she would want the £1.5m to be given to charity, rather than wasted, on this irrelevant statue, that is nothing more than another hollow example of the all pervasive cult of celebrity. One suspects though she probably isn’t and what work she has done was a case of ‘good PR’.

It’s not to misunderstand art and what it tries to achieve to simply and openly criticise such pointless endeavors as these, and if Marc Quinn comes out with any quotations along the lines of ‘it challenges people's perceptions…’ then we really are entering the world of the mundane – a gold statue of a ‘beauty’ passing for a meaningful piece of art?

She’s, according to Quinn, ‘the ideal beauty of the moment’, which is an incredibly asinine thing to say. That it’s being said of a well-known cocaine abuser who has done nothing of note that will live on beyond her demise is more than a little depressing.

(No) Logo

I'd rather this man's logo was used instead of the rather less attractive official logo. Sausages will always be in fashion but new-rave will not.

Number Crunching

I was in London for a job interview the other day and afterwards I went for a wander around the Tate Modern which had a very interesting exhibition about cities around our planet. The best statistic that was on display was this:

"Sao Paulo has a tube network 40km² for 18 million people, while London has a tube network of 140km² which serves 8 million people" - which is pretty staggering if you think about it.