12 August 2013
Art in London
- We make the most of a day off and go visit the Art Galleries of
London. It's been a while, but we really enjoyed catching these
'must-see' summer shows. Big names, big art, BIG fun!
We
didn't want to let these shows slip us by, so we had to plan to catch
up. Summer 2013 has been a spectacular season in the London art
calender! 8 shows in one day... Here's what we enjoyed:
Saloua Raouda Choucair - The world’s first major museum exhibition of Lebanese artist Saloua Raouda Choucair. A wonderful show that celebrates this artist’s extraordinary body of work. Choucair is a pioneer of abstract art in the Middle East and, born in 1916, takes her rightful position as a significant figure in the history of twentieth-century art. A brilliant collection of works, I loved her sculptures.
Ibrahim El-Salahi - The first Tate Modern exhibition dedicated to African Modernism traces the life and work of Ibrahim El-Salahi. This major retrospective brings together 100 works from across more than five decades of his international career. The exhibition highlights one of the most significant figures in African and Arab Modernism and reveals his place in the context of a broader, global art history. A spooky world of abstract forms, really good!
Meschac Gaba - The Benin artist Meschac Gaba first conceived the Museum of Contemporary African Art during his 1996–7 residency at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten in Amsterdam. He describes finding ‘another reality’ when visiting museums in Europe, a reality in which he could not imagine how the art he wanted to create could be integrated: ‘I needed a space for my work, because this did not exist.’ A very entertaining show, great art!
Ellen Gallagher - Ellen Gallagher is one of the most acclaimed contemporary artists to have emerged from North America since the mid-1990s. Her gorgeously intricate and highly imaginative works are realised with a wealth of virtuoso detail and wit. This is her first major solo exhibition in the UK, providing the first ever opportunity to explore an overview of her twenty-year career. The best show of our Tate Modern visit. Detailed, moving and full of drama!
The Alternative Guide to the Universe - The Alternative Guide to the Universe explores the work of self-taught artists and architects, fringe physicists and visionary inventors, all of whom offer bracingly unorthodox perspectives on the world we live in. Eccentric and inspiring, their work re-imagines our social and cultural conventions in ways that fearlessly depart from accepted ways of thinking. An entertaining show, very, very good! The art of Lee Godie was particularly moving, a sample of her work is seen below.
L. S. Lowry - A major exhibition of landscapes by the much-loved British painter L. S. Lowry – the first of its kind held by a public institution in London since the artist’s death.
Focusing on the best of Lowry’s urban scenes and industrial landscapes including Tate’s Coming Out of School 1927 and The Pond 1950 alongside significant loans, this timely and carefully selected exhibition aims to re-assess Lowry’s contribution to art history and to argue for his achievement as Britain’s pre-eminent painter of the industrial city. A wonderful collection, we saw many of these at The Lowry in Salford, Manchester.
Gary Hume - Part of the internationally celebrated group of ‘Young British Artists’ that studied at London’s Goldsmiths College in the late 1980s, Gary Hume (born 1962) has gone on to become one of Britain’s most highly respected painters. Tate Britain presents a focused survey spanning Hume’s career that explores the breadth and vitality of his work. Including well known and recent paintings, as well as international loans that have not been seen in the UK before, this exhibition highlights Hume’s innovative use of colour, line and surface in his distinctive compositions. A big, fat colour blast... Great!
Saloua Raouda Choucair - The world’s first major museum exhibition of Lebanese artist Saloua Raouda Choucair. A wonderful show that celebrates this artist’s extraordinary body of work. Choucair is a pioneer of abstract art in the Middle East and, born in 1916, takes her rightful position as a significant figure in the history of twentieth-century art. A brilliant collection of works, I loved her sculptures.
Ibrahim El-Salahi - The first Tate Modern exhibition dedicated to African Modernism traces the life and work of Ibrahim El-Salahi. This major retrospective brings together 100 works from across more than five decades of his international career. The exhibition highlights one of the most significant figures in African and Arab Modernism and reveals his place in the context of a broader, global art history. A spooky world of abstract forms, really good!
Meschac Gaba - The Benin artist Meschac Gaba first conceived the Museum of Contemporary African Art during his 1996–7 residency at the Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten in Amsterdam. He describes finding ‘another reality’ when visiting museums in Europe, a reality in which he could not imagine how the art he wanted to create could be integrated: ‘I needed a space for my work, because this did not exist.’ A very entertaining show, great art!
Ellen Gallagher - Ellen Gallagher is one of the most acclaimed contemporary artists to have emerged from North America since the mid-1990s. Her gorgeously intricate and highly imaginative works are realised with a wealth of virtuoso detail and wit. This is her first major solo exhibition in the UK, providing the first ever opportunity to explore an overview of her twenty-year career. The best show of our Tate Modern visit. Detailed, moving and full of drama!
The Alternative Guide to the Universe - The Alternative Guide to the Universe explores the work of self-taught artists and architects, fringe physicists and visionary inventors, all of whom offer bracingly unorthodox perspectives on the world we live in. Eccentric and inspiring, their work re-imagines our social and cultural conventions in ways that fearlessly depart from accepted ways of thinking. An entertaining show, very, very good! The art of Lee Godie was particularly moving, a sample of her work is seen below.
L. S. Lowry - A major exhibition of landscapes by the much-loved British painter L. S. Lowry – the first of its kind held by a public institution in London since the artist’s death.
Focusing on the best of Lowry’s urban scenes and industrial landscapes including Tate’s Coming Out of School 1927 and The Pond 1950 alongside significant loans, this timely and carefully selected exhibition aims to re-assess Lowry’s contribution to art history and to argue for his achievement as Britain’s pre-eminent painter of the industrial city. A wonderful collection, we saw many of these at The Lowry in Salford, Manchester.
Gary Hume - Part of the internationally celebrated group of ‘Young British Artists’ that studied at London’s Goldsmiths College in the late 1980s, Gary Hume (born 1962) has gone on to become one of Britain’s most highly respected painters. Tate Britain presents a focused survey spanning Hume’s career that explores the breadth and vitality of his work. Including well known and recent paintings, as well as international loans that have not been seen in the UK before, this exhibition highlights Hume’s innovative use of colour, line and surface in his distinctive compositions. A big, fat colour blast... Great!
Patrick Caulfield - Tate Britain presents a survey exhibition of the celebrated British painter, Patrick Caulfield (1936–2005). From the 1960s, Caulfield has been known for his iconic and vibrant paintings of modern life that reinvigorated traditional artistic genres such as the still life. Celebrating the artist’s mastery of colour, graphic elegance as well as his wit, this exhibition offers the chance to reassess his influences and the legacy of his approach to painting.
Patrick Caulfield came to prominence in the mid-1960s after studying at the Royal College of Art where fellow students included David Hockney. Through his participation in the defining The New Generation exhibition at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in 1964, he became associated with Pop Art. However he resisted this label throughout his career, instead preferring to see himself as a ‘formal artist’ and an inheritor of painting traditions from Modern Masters such as Georges Braque, Juan Gris and Fernand Léger who influenced his composition and choice of subject matter. The BEST... I love the work of this wonderful Artist. The image below is of 'After Lunch 1975' - it has always been one of my favourite pieces of art!
Between 7 and 10 out of 10!
