...STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN.....

           

As it enters its fnal week we finally got to the V&A to see ' The Cult of Beauty - The Aesthetic Movement 1860 - 1900 ' which I enjoyed very much - it was interesting to see the Pre-Raphaelite movement placed into a wider cultural context , and the influence of the Aesthetic Movement on both the burgeoning Arts and Crafts movement and the then  growing interest in domestic interior decoration , which was always going to appeal, given my background . Exhibitions these days tend to be very much more than a single artist collection , and the setting within a wider social context allows for both a greater collection of exhibits and a greater interpretation - sometimes reinterpretation - and understanding of both their time and their place.

.........We then wandered through to the newly re-vamped Renaissance Galleries - The Simon Sainsbury gallery is particularly effective , where again - much on the lines of the Sackler Gallery at the RA - a hitherto inaccessible external space has now been roofed over and incorporated within the main exhibition space , providing a top-lit space of considerable height in which to display more architectural elements.........visible in this first picture is one of the few timber-frame building frontages to survive the Great Fire of London , and close up the scale and size is quite spectacular.......

........but to my mind by far the most intriguing , if not bizarre , exhibit is this staircase , marooned in flight , going nowhere . Rescued from a Breton house in the town of Morlaix at around 1860 , it dates back to around the 17th century ; but why would someone just preserve the staircase ? Staircases , more than most other architectural forms , depend on context to make sense.........where was it going from, where was it going to ? Quite a few of the treads have not survived , particularly  the top flight , and neither have the landings ,  so being able to climb the stairs is a non-starter . A structure robbed of its meaning , an exo-skeleton , a journey suspended and preserved in time. The support steelwork is minimalist , beautifully detailed and executed , and the whole of the staircase must have been dry assembled within a scaffolding frame , to allow the steelwork to be set-out prior to manufacture; the support steelwork then determines the setting out and construction of the wall , so the staircase for once dictates the surrounding construction. The whole structure hangs there lightly in space , a staircase without steps ,a ghost from times past...............

It just looked so light and so beautiful.......

...THRILLS, SPILLS AND BELLYACHES.........

Soooooo.................2 days into Le Tour and last years winner Contador ( possibly ) has already been bumped down to 75th in the overall classification , due to the unwitting intervention of a spectator together with falling outside the 3K ruling for the finish.

......and none of the teams fussed about helping him out . Already some 102 seconds down on Shleck and Evans and with last years winning margin only 38 seconds , its looking like being a long hard road for the Spanish rider - and still 3 Sundays to go. Lets hope Millar ( currently second ) and Cavendish have more luck.

....ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST.....

......This last weekend saw the final demise of Habitat here in the UK , the high-street furniture / lifestyle shop that seems to have been around forever ; its ultimate failure was , they say , down to its inability to adapt. Adapt to what.........?

......It's difficult now , from this point in time , to appreciate how groundbreaking and important the Habitat shops - and even more so the catalogues - were when they first started appearing in the late 'sixties. The first and second generation of design students to come through the art college system - and ' design ' rather than 'art ' is the operative word here - were just about starting out on their professional careers to become the first wave of what is now the Design Profession , and wanted a lifestyle to match the design-led experience of their time at college. Out with the austerity and tiredness of their parent's world , a generation exhausted by the Second World War and its aftermath , in with a bright new future. Enter Habitat , providing the furniture , the fabrics , the kitchen accessories and the clean ' Provencal ' vision of a lifestyle looking forward towards the brightness of the continent rather than backwards to dark utility furniture and those heavily patterned carpets.

Terrance Conran had a vision , to bring contemporary homeware and furnishings to the masses at an affordable price, and the aspiring middle classes loved it - a set of the early Habitat catalogues through to around 1980 or so would tell you all you need to know about the history of design in the home ; it's all there , at 30p a time. It couldn't last , but essentially the ultimate ' failure ' of the Habitat chain is down to the fact that during its time it was enormously successful  and achieved everything that it set out to do , changing the public face of design in the UK for ever . Conran's importance as both  retailer and restaurateur cannot be overstated - single-handedly he dragged the high street into the second half of the 20th century.

Habitat had eventually run its course and its time was up ; the design world has changed out of all recognition in the past forty years or so . Designers pour out of the colleges at the rate of some 5,000 or so a year , designers set up their own branded businesses and outlets, design magazines proliferate , the entire globe is sourced for designs and inspiration , everyone is now their own design guru. To say Habitat failed ' because it couldn't adapt ' is to miss the point entirely ; it's a bit like saying the Beatles failed because they couldn't adapt to all the genres that comprise the current musical scene . The Beatles kicked down the door and everyone else followed ; likewise Conran and Habitat kicked down their own door and made it possible for everything that followed in the world of design on the High Street , and for this we should owe them an enormous debt of gratitude...............

...............and remember them fondly for those heady days of the early seventies when we could furnish our first homes as WE wanted, red enamel coffee pot , chicken brick and all........

..WHEN THE GOING GETS TOUGH...

.......The tough get going..............Its that time of year again. and Le Tour gets going on Saturday 2nd July for three tough weeks in the sun.....

It seems a long time ago, now , but four weeks ago , back on the 4th of June , the English football team struggled to a 2 - 2 draw with Switzerland in  a Euro qualifier - the manager of the team struggled to explain their tiredness and lack of motivation. Motivated to play for your country ? Tiredness ? And  there was me , thinking footballers were highly trained athletes......

In this context , it's interesting to read the Guardian Sport  ' Big Interview ' this week with the cyclist David Millar of Team Garmin , whose autobiography has just been published , already odds-on favorite for Sports book of the year. Last year was a hard Tour and he suffered , but he didn't realise until after he had spent the last week climbing in the Alps and finished the Tour that he had three broken ribs.......broken during the first week. Interesting to read , also , his comments with regard to his fellow British riders Mark Cavendish and Bradley Wiggins......

The full interview can be read at

www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/jun/28/david-millar-bradley-wiggins-tour-de-france

Good luck to him, and good luck to Cav . Bradley Wiggins ?  Lets see...............

....REASONS TO BE CHEERFUL.........

Well , the canvas that was discussed in the posting of 12th June was duly submitted for the Derbyshire Open art exhibition held in Buxton , one of over 400 entries . Stiff competition, then  ....................

.........and this Monday a postcard duly dropped through the letterbox advising that not only had it been selected , it had received a commendation from the judges . Given that this was the first time that I have ever entered a painting for any competition anywhere , to be one of ten commended works to go alongside the ten prize winners is no mean achievement , so I am really pleased .........although having now seen the rest of the selected entries I am slightly embarrassed by my own technical shortcomings - there were a lot that were better than mine. 

112 of the works go on display from this weekend at the Museum and Art gallery in Buxton , running through to 2nd September , and many are for sale.................including mine ( although posted at a price that in retrospect was a mistake ) The Derbyshire Open website is at
www.derbyshire.gov.uk/leisure/buxton_museum/derbyshire_open 

........hhhhmmmmm - and so for next year I have some ideas........maybe ' What Mary Did Next ' ?

.......DARKNESS AT THE EDGE OF TOWN.......

He breathed in air, he breathed out light..............

Clarence Clemons was my delight.

R.I.P

( with apologies to Adrian Mitchell )

.......RAG DOLL ( MATERIAL GIRL )

..........This last weekend it was the annual Barnaby festival here in Macclesfield and a lot of creativity was on show , including the opening of a new gallery - Jack Sevens Art Yard - which in a small town like Macc is only to be welcomed . The exbibition space is really good , and lets hope they attract some good work and help raise the profile of the arts in this area. 

....To my mind , however , the most creative and interesting event by far was an installation  - 'Tales From the Tower ' by Teresa Wilson in the Savage Chapel Tower , St Michael's Church .

For a start , the church is just around the corner from us here in the centre of Macc and I pass it most days , but I had never noticed the medieval tower just off to the side ; a fascinating space in its own right with a small footprint spread over three floors. The art work consisted of four discrete but interrelated installations on each level of the tower. " She uses puppets made from rags and recycled materials to suggest stories to the viewer and to explore emotional , challenging and sometimes uncomfortable subject matter in a gentle and playful way. The work is about the transmutation of undigested experience ; timelessness , darkness and enchantment "

To my mind though , to categorise them as rag-dolls diminishes them somewhat ; in their thin, gaunt , reduced state their more direct references to me are as mummies , their memories and remains enbalmed in cloth now reduced to rags  .......quite dark and very impressive .

Teresa's website is at http://www.teresawilson.co.uk/ and she is one of the Vernon Mill Artists based in Vernon Mill in Stockport ; on a day when the sky went dark and the heavens opened it was quite a dramatic experience.