Freize at Regent's Park and Nalla Design

Great to see Vicki Young of Nalla’s design featured in Saturday The Times .  I really enjoyed working with Nalla on the recent Christmas campaign for Greene King IPA.

 

Also went to Frieze & Frieze Masters; enjoyed both events for their diverse approach.

Loved the Petersham Nurseries input at Frieze.  Regents Park is such a great venue.

 

Having been to the House of Illustration at Kings Cross last week, a really interesting cross-section of art in different disciplines, particularly E.H. Shepard's illustrations.

 

Looking forward to Goya and silver point drawings at the National and British Museum.

 

Melvyn Bragg’s Radio 4 programme on Hans Holbein The Younger was really insightful.  I think Holbein’s pencil and chalk drawings are so powerful and contemporary, almost like being in the presence of the sitters.  Drawing is difficult but underpins so much.

 

 

Banksy to Ai Weiwei

Banksy's Dismaland has just closed!

I was intrigued to see it and glad I did - it was worth the 4 hour drive there and back again…

I went with friends and we had such a good time. Despite its name and intentions of the staff to prevent it, there were many laugh out loud moments, as well as impressive ones, looking at the art and amazing installations on show. A lot of skill and investment had gone into the whole production. Tickets sold out as soon as they hit the internet; I'd have gone back.

The wood from the structures is going to Calais to make shelters for refugees!

I saw Ai Weiwei at the RA - also thought-provoking like Jeff Koons, I also saw at the Whitney, New York, 2014 - a great technician and ideas person. I wondered how hands-on he is or is concept all? - particularly his exhibits showing stages of his incarceration, and his marble field of blades of grass. I'd love to see his studios and where he stores his vast pieces before they go on tour.

Looking forward to the silver paint drawings at the British Museum. Talking of drawing, really enjoyed studying the Maclise Waterloo Cartoon at the RA. Amazing draftsman on an awesome scale! The kind of skill that in its classic style is out of fashion at the moment but, despite its stylistic approach, worthy of a visit.

Saw Bridget Riley at Bexhill recently; another great influence on interior design and graphics.

Looking forward to seeing the film The Lobster and A Bigger Splash. Enjoyed Dear Lupin at the theatre.

Glad to see the Armada portrait back at Woburn Abbey; one of my favourite iconistic pictures of Elizabeth I - all those Pearls divers risked their lives for!

 

Alexander McQueen

Great exhibition, apparently the best attended of almost any other exhibition at the V&A and was just as brilliant as the Isabella Blow exhibition at Somerset house recently. The creative ideas adopted to present his pieces were inspired.

Pleasure & Pain

Really enjoyed the ‘Pleasure & pain’ shoe exhibition at the V&A, as well as talking to the curator about her ideas for presenting the exhibition – a must for all shoe lovers!

Summer Exhibition

Loved the turquoise blue and pink backgrounds to the artworks and also thought the hanging of the pictures appeared to give the impression of more space.