In the first few years of the National Lottery, museums were built employing architects who had no interest in museums per se but instead limitlessly indulged their own vanity. Those who drew attention to the blatant unsuitability of resulting buildings were dissed as old-fashioned, traditional and behind the architectural times. The result of this defended… Continue reading Imperial War Museum North: the pitfalls of novelty
House of Commons art collection: hard bargains and money well spent
What a kerfuffle occurred recently concerning how much the House of Commons has spent – £250,000 in 20 years no less – on portraits of its more distinguished and long-serving members. How shocking and self-indulgent was the general tenor of the response. Well, no actually. To get two dozen paintings for 250 grand suggests someone… Continue reading House of Commons art collection: hard bargains and money well spent
Van Dyck self portrait: do we really want to pay £12 million for this?
The self-portrait by Van Dyck is the subject of a deferred export licence in order to give British museums an opportunity to find the £12.5 million required to stop it going abroad. The NPG, where the picture is currently on show drumming up donations, has started a campaign to raise £12.5 million to acquire the… Continue reading Van Dyck self portrait: do we really want to pay £12 million for this?
Graham Sutherland: exultant strangeness at Abbott Hall and Crane Kalman
Few save masochists would venture as far as Kendal in order to see work by Bethan Huws, not least because unless you happen to have attended one of State Art’s indoctrination sessions you won’t have heard of her. A taste considered acquirable only by the starving, Huws is among State Art’s chosen apostles. Sadly, she… Continue reading Graham Sutherland: exultant strangeness at Abbott Hall and Crane Kalman
National Rail Museum
The most elegantly streamlined of all British Rail’s steam locomotives was the Great North Eastern Region A4 class of which an engine called Mallard is the best known of the 35 built at Doncaster works. Designed in 1935 by Sir Nigel Gresley, whose earlier A3 class (of which Flying Scotsman is the preserved example) was… Continue reading National Rail Museum
Perming eight from twelve: Lowry and the painting of modern life at Tate Britain
Lowry deserves treatment as a serious artist, though more usually such an approach is denied him because of, firstly, his suspiciously wide popularity and, secondly, what is mistakenly characterised as stylistic primitivism. A strong whiff of the patronizing informed reviews of this exhibition, as though the work was a tad unsophisticated for critics used to… Continue reading Perming eight from twelve: Lowry and the painting of modern life at Tate Britain
Martin Creed: new definitions for ‘gift’
Regular readers may recall from a recent editorial that when ‘we’ bought Yinka Shonibare’s Trafalgar Square bottle to stand outside the National Maritime Museum ten times more was paid for it than had ever been paid for a work by this artist at auction. That story of casual profligacy is now repeated in respect of… Continue reading Martin Creed: new definitions for ‘gift’
Out of touch
I spent a month recently in a 12th-floor ward of the new Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel. Except for the thrilling views of the capital it provides, it is an undistinguished public building, not least because like all hospitals nowadays its corridors are lined with ‘Art’. Not even I could raise a flicker of interest… Continue reading Out of touch
Arts Council – time for action
A submission to the House of Commons’ Select Committee for Culture concerning their short enquiry into the commissioning criteria used by the Arts Council of England. From the editor of The Jackdaw Your interest in the artistic criteria underpinning ACE’s funding decisions is a subject which has long exercised me. I wish to demonstrate here… Continue reading Arts Council – time for action
Serpentine Gallery: working at home
The last three editorials have dealt with a charity called the Serpentine Gallery. We’ve observed limousines lined up outside signifying whose interests the gallery really serves. We have identified overmanning and fat cat pay increases for two directors. And, last time, we highlighted an outside PR agency working between press and gallery in order to… Continue reading Serpentine Gallery: working at home