"Storm batters southern Britain"

This is what the 'rush hour' looks like when "Storms Batter Southern Britain" - BBC

The sun is shinning, there is no rain, some gusts of wind and everything is at a stand still.

“Virgin Records: 40 Years of Disruptions”

I visited the “Virgin Records: 40 Years of Disruptions” exhibition at Victoria House and was disappointed. It had the feel of a backdrop to possibly a very good opening night party but was flat as a standalone exhibition. It is no more than a collection of memorabilia. This was surprising considering its subject but maybe rock ‘n’ roll is not supposed to be exhibited, it’s intended to be experienced. I specifically went to see the recreation of the first Virgin record shop, which was part of the exhibition, but it was nothing like I remembered.

Despite my qualms it was good to see slices of music that I had lived through. From Mike Oldfield to the Sex Pistols and beyond. Good to know that Virgin Records are still going strong and still signing interesting acts, such as Daft Punk (without seeing their faces, or so the Virgin PR machine will have us believe) and Deadmau5

This is what Virgin Records are good at.

Viewing Rooms

AVA have created an exceptional exhibition in the Crypt of Marylebone church to coincide with Frieze. “Viewing Room” features such artists as the great Kate MccGwire. the Chapman brothers, Alastair Mackie and others. The setting, in the crypt of the church, works really well with the macabre themes featuring cuttlefish bones and “undulating biomorphic forms intricately veneered in feathers”

Well worth a visit.

Check out the shadows

The Future Can Wait

With Frieze about to open on 17^th October the London art scene is in full swing with galleries eager to capitalise on the art worlds movers and shakers flooding into London. Never slow out of the blocks, the Saatchi Gallery kicked things off with the excellent “The Future Can Wait” at Victoria House, Bloomsbury. Thought-provoking as always in a very interesting exhibition space. Always helps to have a glass of cava in hand at 11am on a Saturday morning.

From Victoria House I walked to the White Cube in Mason’s Yard. For once I was truly stopped in my tracks by the absolute codswallop on show. A collection of glass fronted wooden boxes, made / displayed / collected (who knows, who cares) by Haim Steinbach containing products bought off the shelf in any store. Titles included “Fibreglass – faced honeycomb boards, plastic laminate and glass box; plastic ‘Sith Infiltrator’ Star Wars spaceship”.  Basically a child’s toy in a box. 

With Frieze in town, which is effectively a 'Pop Up' gallery in Regents Park able to exhibit the work of over 1,000 artists, it must be difficult to find new ‘stuff’ to exhibit elsewhere. 

Haim Steinbach's exhibition at the White Cube could kill the goose that laid the golden egg. As Grayson Perry pointed out "we are all bohemians now" and hence art has lost it's power to shock. The game could be up.

Ghost Sign - Earlham Street, Seven Dials

 Ghost sign above a shop in Earlham Street, close to Covent Garden

Elastic Glue manufacturer (sole inventor - 1857)

Tittup

Word of the Day

tittup \TIT-uhp\, noun:

1. an exaggerated prancing, bouncing movement or manner of moving.

verb:
1. to move, especially to walk, in an exaggerated prancing or bouncing way, as a spirited horse.

Now and again three donkeys would start, urged from behind, and slowly tittup their burdens along the pond's margin.
-- John Galsworthy, The White Monkey, 1924

She heard him tittup down the stairs, grope for his shoes in the dark, and creep from the house.
-- Daphne du Maurier, Mary Anne, 1954

Tittup came to English in the 1600s from the imitative sound of a horse's feet hitting the ground.

Peter Ackroyd, New York Times

Peter Ackroyd’s London Calling - New York Times, September 12th 2013 - (Click Here)

St Paul's Catherdral

St Paul's Cathedral basking in the warm evening sunshine.

Gangle

Word of the Day for Saturday, October 5, 2013

gangle \GANG-guhl\, verb:

to move awkwardly or ungracefully: A tall, stiff-jointed man gangled past.

His long arms and legs seemed to gangle around the compact dimensions of his pony. He drew to a halt.
-- Jane Smiley, The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton, 1998

Those long legs that used to gangle could run.
-- E.J. Rath, The Brains of the Family, 1925

Gangle arose in the 1960s as a back formation of the word gangling, a variant of the word gangrel.