Category: art

edinburgh art

November 18th, 2008 · · art, scotland Comments Off

jc & gbm @ fruitmarket

Apologies for the long break in posting – a couple a big submissions at work combined with excessive watching of ‘The Wire’ have left me with limited time at the computer. Will be summarising quite a bit in the next few posts so don’t expect too much detail.

We missed most the Edinburgh festival season this year as we were away in France but did sneak over on the last weekend in August to catch a couple of art exhibitions still running.

Initially we got up close and personal with Tracey Emmin’s personal effects at her first retrospective at Modern Art Gallery, a lot of her stuff was quite moving, although the tapestries were a little difficult to interpret.

We then caught Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller‘s fantastic show at the Fruitmarket Gallery, beautifully whimsical, the animatronic, interactive, sensory, soundscapes were magical, and even if they are one trick ponies as cityofsound alludes is his review of their show in Sydney – it is a damn fine trick!

london in the summertime

August 29th, 2008 · · architecture, art, food, sustainability, tim, travel log Comments Off

serpentine pavillionWe snuck down to London for the first time in over year at the end of July, to see friends, catch the tail end of the London Festival of Architecture, visit a few galleries and generally see London in summer for the first time.

It was a great weekend, we popped by the just opened Serpentine Pavillion by Frank Gehry (above), although we couldn’t get in because of a fancy pants party, as well spending a fantastic half a day in the Psycho Buildings exhibition at the awesomely brutalist Hayward Gallery. I suppose it was to be expected given our profession but the artists interpreting architecture lent itself to some absolutely brilliant pieces in my opinion – including a spooky dolls house city by Rachael Whiteread a surreal frozen explosion by the Cubans Los Carpinteros and the chance to paddle about on the roof of the gallery courtesy of Gelitin’s Normally, Proceeding and unrestricted without title (below)

sailing on the sky

We caught up with old friends and farewelled some too, there aren’t many Australians left it seems. We had time to more fully explore the east end of the city wandering about the hipster paradised of Hoxton & Shoreditch, getting our fill of vietnamese (as we can’t find any in Glasgow) and trying out the eco-friendly Waterhouse – which in it’s suitable obscure location served up excellent fare although I was skeptical about prawns flown in from Thailand irrespective of the sustainability of their production.

little sparta

July 30th, 2008 · · art, scotland, tim Comments Off

stones

On another quiet weekend this month we spent a pleasant Sunday investigating Ian Hamilton-Findlay’s Little Sparta garden. On a par with Charles Jencks Garden of Cosmic Speculation in terms of influence in the landscape art world it is on a much smaller more intimate scale and while it has intriging moments I found it less compelling.

On our way home we stopped in to our friends parent’s house in Leadhills (the 2nd highest village in Scotland) and had a fantastic foursies in their garden – which it turned out had almost as much to offer as Little Sparta.

costa del solway and the garden of cosmic speculation

May 12th, 2008 · · architecture, art, scotland, travel log Comments Off

sandyhill bay

The lack of recent posts has been down to some decidedly summerlike weather (5 days without rain!) which has seen us in the garden and out at the allotment. Our seedlings are getting rather huge in the conservatory, although many of the ones that we planted out have been decimated by slugs! I finally added the roof to the greenhouse this weekend so with the addition of a door and an industrial load of gap filler we’ll be at lock up stage.

last weekend for the first of 2 may long weekends we headed south into the Dumfries region. We camped on the Solway Coast in one of those decidedly Brittish holiday parks, complete with green caravans, kids with buckets & spades and a decidedly underwhelming beach, although this one was much less garish than most and beautifully sited overlooking a little bay (above).

smugglers cove

We walked from our campsite along the coast to the delightful Rocklciffe & Kipford (more boats – you have to feel for poor Chhay, having to put up with me) , past little settlements and ultimate natural smugglers hideouts (above) carved into the cliffs. We also found time to explore the atmospheric ruined Sweetheart Abbey and the attendant cute little town of New Abbey (below).

sweetheart abbey from new abbey

On the Sunday we headed back past Dumfries (itself an interesting if a little sketchy regional centre with great winding lanes and beautiful red sandstone housing stock) to the reason for our trip – Charles Jencks own Garden of Cosmic Speculation. Open to the public on only one day a year it is an esoteric, sometimes humorous sculptural post modern landscape treat. Curving grass helixes (below), mirrored ponds, obscure sculptures tucked into hidden groves (bottom) as well as complex hydrological features make for a fascinating place for exploring and it was incredibly popular – packed with the funkier edge of the blue rinse set.

from the snail tower

While some of it was a little too post modern for my black skivvied taste, it is an amazing place, showing that there is more to the old critic than a few architecture tomes. As always more at our flickr
bluebells

gi lunches: highwire

April 21st, 2008 · · art, glasgow, scotland, tim Comments Off

red road

photo from GI website.

I’ve got a stack of stuff to catch up on after a few weekends away, but for now the next in my lunchtime Glasgow International investigations.

Today the CCA with the end result of last year’s highwire event. The footage itself was interesting but not all that powerful, despite the intense post rationalism of the failure the complete the walk in the booklet. Better were the enlarged negative images of the red road flats, with the path of the wire torn through the film. The presented a spectural, otherwordly view of the often derided tower blocks, which reinforced my impression of them from their starring role in the recent Scotttish film ‘Red Road’ which we watched last week.

Supporting info about the construction of the towers in the early 60′s and the slum clearances that accompanied them was also ineteresting – espcially the linen drawings and multiple references to asbestos.

gi lunches: jim lambie

April 18th, 2008 · · art, glasgow, scotland, tim Comments Off

jim lambie

Having missed all the free drinks at the various openings of the Glasgow International on Saturday due to illness, I have decided to scope out a few exhibititions at lunchtimes – the advent of spring sunshine supporting my endeavours for the moment.
First stop today was Turner nominated Jim Lambie at the often dissapointing GOMA. I was pleasantly surprised with his show ‘Forever Changes’, he has tranformed the entire space rather well, with a halucengenic striped floor covering connecting the works and showcasing the main exhibition space at GOMA in its best light. I aslo enjoyed stacks of vinyl enbeded in concrete titled sonic reducer.