My Top 5 Exhibitions of 2015

If you've read my blog for a while, you'll know that I love a good exhibition. And 2015 was no exception! Scanning through my diary I realised that I've visited a whopping 15 exhibitions at 9 different museums and galleries over the last 12 months including galleries in London, Paris, Bath, Budapest and little old Eastbourne. My ArtFund Pass definitely worked out overcome and more than paid for itself! So, I thought I narrow them down to my top 5 museum events of the year and have a good ol' reminisce about my favourites.

1. Savage Beauty at the V&A

The Alexander McQueen exhibition was one of the most anticipated of the year and I remember logging on to my computer the moment tickets came on sale. I was not disappointed - this was a showstopper in every sense of the word. Beautifully displayed outfits in glass cages conjured up a cabinet of curiosities feel and showcased McQueen's sheer creative genius perfectly. Read my full review here.

2. Sonia Delaunay at the Tate Modern

I hadn't heard much about Sonia Delaunay before exploring the summer exhibition at the Tate, but now she is one of my absolute favourites. A textile designer, painter, tapestry weaver, and fashion designer; the sheer abundance of her creative output is so very impressive. I couldn't help but be inspired by her as you can read in this blog post here. She truly was an incredibly talented woman.

3. Silent Partners at the Fitzwilliam Museum

Back in January I visited the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge for the first time and saw the Silent Partners exhibition. The 'silent partners' showcased were artist's dummies of all different types and varieties, from wooden mannequins and childlike dolls to more sinister creations. This was one of the most eery and magical displays I saw this year and something a little bit different!

4. Liberty in Fashion at the Fashion & Textile Museum

When I heard that the Fashion & Textile Museum in London (one of my perennial faves) would be putting on an exhibition of Liberty fashion in the autumn I knew it would be right up my street. Florals and fashion are a match made in heaven, and the exhibition gave a wonderful look at how Liberty has influenced what we wear through the decades, from smocked blouses to ditsy print dresses. Read my full review here.

5. Splendour and Misery: Pictures of Prostitution at the Musee D'Orsary

Earlier this year I went on a mini weekend break to Paris with some friends. Luckily they also enjoy museums and were happy to come along to the Musee D'Orsay where there was an exhibition on prostitution in art. Not your average topic for a fine art gallery but I really loved what they did with this concept. Aside from some rather risque photographs from the Victorian era that would make your grandma blush, there were some beautiful paintings by Toulouse Lautrec, Degas and Manet. It was so special to see these in real life and the whole exhibition really opened me up to look at art in a different way and to see how women in Paris were seen by these predominately male artists. 

So that's my round-up of what I saw in 2015. Let me know what exhibitions you loved last year and what you are looking forward to in 2016. Here's to many more hours spent in museums and galleries!

A bientot!
Xx

The painter that Britain forgot

The Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne is one of my favourite places to visit when I'm back down south. It's a lovely space with great coffee and wonderful gift shop (containing these cushions of dreams). The Ravilious Room is really special and contains some of Eric Ravilious's most famous works, all featuring scenes of the beautiful Sussex Downs.

But the reason for going along this time was to see the Towner's latest exhibition: 'William Gear: The Painter that Britain forgot'. William Gear was an abstract painter working in the 1940s and 50s who produced some radical and highly controversial pieces. Autumn Landscape is perhaps his most well known paintings, deemed an extravagant waste of money when it won a £500 prize and was exhibited at the 1951 Festival of Britain. Although at the time this radical anti-establishment style of painting brought Gear fame and recognition, his work, both as an artist and as a pioneering curator at the Towner, seems to have been largely forgotten.

It was so inspiring to see and learn about these paintings, and to discover them anew. It seem such a shame that these incredibly dynamic works of arts have been hidden from view and have largely escaped the pages of art books. They form part of Britain's art canon and were an important part of that wave of artistic creativity that boomed in the 1950s.

William Gear's paintings are bursting with colour. I particularly like the two pieces below with their pale greens and lilac clashing and contrasting with the stark black patterns. Everything about his work seems vibrant and alive. I feel very lucky to have had a little glimpse into his world and learn a bit more about the history of the Towner and a forgotten artist whose paintings are now once again centre stage.

There's something about Audrey

Audrey Hepburn. Two words that conjure up more than simply one person. A ballerina, movie star, model, mother and Unicef ambassador - Audrey played more parts than seems possible to fit into one lifetime. Which is perhaps why the National Portrait Gallery's exhibition 'Portraits of an Icon' is titled so perfectly. Audrey Hepburn is iconic in that she can't be categorised. She lives on in films, in posters on the walls of student digs, on mugs and fridge magnets. She is everything and anything - a dream figure who everyone wants to be.

Audrey has been so often written about and discussed that she has become her own sort of cliché. The words gamine and elfish have been bandied about so often that they now seem slightly stale, especially when set against the actual photos. Looking at the many faces of Audrey in the NPG, was like discovering her afresh. The display maps out her life through photographs, from childhood days in Belgium, through ballet school and into her more famous and iconic years of the 1950s and 60s. Often set against the most plain of backdrops, Audrey is captured by photographers such as Richard Avedon, Cecil Beaton, Norman Parkinson and Irving Penn to show off her personality and grace rather than fashionable outfits. 

What I loved most about the exhibition was seeing Audrey photographed in more candid and spontaneous moments, in photos I had never seen before. Seeing her on set surrounded by cameras and chatting with cast members was fascinating and really showed a passion and enthusiasm for her work. Photos of holidays, days out with her children and even a shopping trip with her pet deer Pippin show give a small idea of her energetic - and somewhat eccentric - personality. Towards the end of the exhibition there is a collection of photographs showing her at work as a Unicef ambassador, a role she carried out for much of the 80s and 90s. It was lovely to see that there was so much more to Audrey Hepburn than we are often led to believe, and that there was a very real and genuine person behind the iconic beehive and cigarette holder now frozen in time.

Audrey Hepburn: Portraits of An Icon is on until 18th October.

I'm now off to watch Breakfast At Tiffany's!

Poetry in motion: Sonia Delaunay

Summer exhibitions at the Tate are always a treat, but I wasn't quite prepared for just how inspiring the Sonia Delaunay exhibition would be. To be quite honest, I hadn't previously heard much about her as an artist, but I decided to go in with an open mind, and I'm so glad I did.

On entering the first room, we were welcomed by Delaunay's incredible paintings. Each painting is divided into segments of vivid colours which fit together to create a whole. We learnt that Delaunay was heavily inspired by music and dance and was part of what was known as simultanism: a group of artists inspired by different art forms coming together. One of my favourite paintings was the image below of a young girl lying across a couch. I love Delaunay's focus on women as pensive and introspective, completely absorbed in their own worlds. Look closely and the young girl is made up of a range of hues, from sickly greens and yellows to bright reds, colour combinations that seem so unusual, but create such an otherworldly atmosphere.

What I found so wonderful about Sonia Delaunay as an artist was the sheer extent of her creative output. I found it incredibly inspiring that an artist explored so many different mediums so effectively to create her own complete world that was so distinctively hers. For a female artist at that time to have such creative freedom over every aspect of her work is inspiring and motivating, even today.

Aside from her work in abstract art and portraiture, Delaunay was also a successful fashion and textiles designer, creating dresses, shoes and beachwear, as well as working on textile commissions for department stores such as Liberty (see images below). Although part of a set of Parisian bohemians, she was not averse to more commercial enterprises, and fashioned designs for the forward-thinking modern women to wear. Delaunay is also known for her work on the costumes for the 1918 Ballet Russes production of Cleopatra, which were also on display. It was wonderful to see these pieces of ballet history, still intact nearly 100 years later.

Sonia Delaunay was also fascinated by the relationship between clothing and literature. Her idea for a 'poem dress' is something I found absolutely incredible. Delaunay collaborated with some of her poet friends to create dresses embellished with poetry, created movable figments of art. She also worked on a short story which she designed to be printed onto a long scarf so that with each fold, a new chapter could be read in small fragments. I completely fell in love with this idea of clothing and fiction complimenting each other and forming part of the same piece of art. I wish more designers would employ some poetry into their work.

My experience of Sonia Delaunay at the Tate was such an overwhelming but inspiring one. Delaunay was such a powerhouse of creativity and I defy anyone to not become motivated and filled with new ideas when visiting her work. I'd love to know what you thought of the exhibition if you managed to make it? Have a lovely weekend! Xx

Shoes: Pleasure and Pain

I've always had a bit of a love-hate relationship shoes. Whilst on the one hand (or should I say foot?!) they can be undoubtedly pretty, stylish and glamorous, and give a much-needed boost to my 5 foot 2 inches, but they can also hurt like hell. Which is why the V&A's new shoe exhibition 'Shoes: Pleasure and Pain' is so perfectly named. 

On display are hundreds of shoes through the ages, each encapsulating a specific aspect of footwear. There is an area dedicated to shoes inspired by the fairy tale, including the iconic red ballet slippers worn by Moira Shearer in The Red Shoes as well as Lily James's glass heel from the recent Cinderella. Another display showed shoes worn by royalty, from Queen Victoria's pumps to Kate Middleton's nude LK Bennett's. 

The exhibition also delved into the more psychological aspect of our relationship with shoes. In a room hidden behind a velvet curtain were a collection of shoes chosen for their connection to desire and fetishism. For hundreds, if not thousands of years, shoes have been worn to reveal and conceal, and like any piece of clothing they say something about the wearer. In the 18th century, a fashion for shoes laced low on the foot was thought scandalous, as it revealed the wearer's coloured stockings beneath. And, of course, who can forget the stiletto, synonymous with femininity, sex, power, and one Carrie Bradshaw.

Pleasure and pain go hand in hand when thinking about the 'lotus' shoes worn by Chinese women right up until the early 20th century. These tiny, intricately embroidered shoes showed the extremes women underwent through the tradition of footbinding to gain a shoe size and gait that was deemed attractive. It's incredible to think that this was still in practise just a little over a hundred years ago.

Another aspect of the exhibition explored our need to collect and display shoes. Showing various shoe collections, from a society woman of the 1920s who kept her shoes in a specially made vanity case, to a more contemporary Reebok trainer collection, there is definitely something special about shoes that makes us want to cherish and preserve them, and showcase them as pieces of our personal identity.

A final showreel of cinematic shoe moments is displayed at the end of this expansive exhibition and if you ever needed a reason to re-watch the likes of Belle du Jour, The Red Shoes or Sex in the City, you'll want to now, if only to observe the beautiful shoes.

The Georgians at the Fashion Museum

To me, Bath is synonymous with fashion. The city conjures up images of Jane Austen characters buying ribbons, or of well-to-do socialites dressing up to take the waters at the Pump Rooms. So it's very fitting that Bath has its own dedicated Fashion Museum. A couple of weeks ago I dragged my sister along to the museum to visit the new exhibition 'The Georgians.'

The Georgians, as you might have guessed, is a collection of Georgian clothing and accessories from the 18th century, a period which holds close ties with Bath from its heyday as the centre of the social season, a city where Austen stayed and based some of her novels (notably Northanger Abbey and Persuasion), and where wealthy aristocrats would take the opportunity to show off their latest purchases when promenading along the streets.

On display were some beautifully embroidered gowns, my favourite being the black dress with red roses (below). Many of the dresses had been altered and re-altered to adapt to the changing fashions of the time, with panels added and taken away or sleeves lengthened according to changes in body shape or style. Much like the Fashion on the Ration exhibition at IWM, 18th century women would consider dresses as a investment, to be reused and worn for many years, but this didn't meant they were averse to the whims of fashion.

One trend on show that I particularly loved was the light, embroidered jackets which were worn over nightgowns. These were so meticulously detailed that nowadays it would seem a little ridiculous to wear them to bed, and its almost a shame that they never got to see the light of day. I could imagine these being recast as some sort of modern day kimono jacket, I would wear one in a heartbeat!

I also loved the style of dress known as the 'sack back' due to its loose sack-like box pleats falling down from the shoulders. There's something very modern about this loose style of clothing, which wasn't what I was expecting from 18th century style. Here is the dress in its full glory.

The exhibition also had some examples of Georgian menswear including frock coats with beautifully embroidered sleeves, and of course, the iconic bright red military jacket which features in so many of Jane Austen's novels (often to signal someone an unsavoury character such as Mr. Wickham!). 

I loved mooching around this beautiful museum in Bath, and learning more about Georgian fashion. If you find yourself in the city then I'd recommend having a nose at all the sartorial gems they have inside, and let me know what you think! 

Have a fabulous Bank Holiday weekend! Xx 

Great British Drawings

As I write this post, it's one of those typical moody, rainy days in Oxford where all I want to do is hide away and drink many cups of peppermint tea. But days like these are also perfect for whiling away a few hours in a museum or gallery and taking in a little culture!

I've been attempting to visit more local museums over the last few weeks, and decided to start with the beautiful Ashmolean. The Ashmolean belongs to the University of Oxford and is the world's first university museums. It all started with a cabinet of curiosities and now houses objects and artefacts spanning thousands of years.

Their main exhibition at the moment is Great British Drawings, a display of over 100 drawings by Britain's greatest artists including Turner, Rossetti, Millais, Ruskin, Hockney and Ravilious. Although my knowledge of fine art is very limited, I loved just walking around the gallery and taking it all in. I was most excited to see some of the Pre-Raphelite drawings, especially the image of Proserpine by Dante Gabriel Rossetti (featured on the leaflet above), which shows the gorgeous red headed ideal of Victorian beauty. 

Another favourite of mine was the small drawing of a rabbit by Edward Lear which forms part of his famous Nonsense Book of Poetry, and would lovely framed up on a wall. I also enjoyed seeing some more modern pieces by the likes of David Hockney and the wonderful Eric Ravilious's drawings of the Sussex countryside. 

The Ashmolean is one of those places where you can simply wander around with a pencil and sketchbook and feel incredibly inspired. I'm trying to make more time for sketching and drawing and whilst my attempts will never make it beyond my ratty old notebook, a little bit of calm and creativity woven into daily life never goes amiss.

Hope you're all having a wonderful weekend!

Fashion and Gardens

Last week I ventured over to Lambeth to visit the Fashion & Gardens exhibition at The Garden Museum. 

I'd heard a little about this new exhibition via the Vogue website and I'm so glad I made the trek over there. The museum itself is a disused church and is right next to Lambeth Palace, across the river from Westminster. It's a beautiful building with a small garden outside and hundreds of dried flowers hanging down from the ceiling. There is a permanent exhibition about the history of gardening as well as a lovely cafe and shop but of course the real reason for going was the fashion!

Curated by Nicola Shulman (sister of Vogue editor Alexandra to you and I) the exhibition comprised of just one room but was beautifully done. As flowers and clothes so commonly go together it could have easily been quite a predictable collection but the whole project was done in such a fascinating way.

Beginning with pieces as early as the 1500s, there were tapestries, embroidered gloves and botanical illustrations, all showing the way gardening has influence clothes. The regimented layouts of 18th century gardens inspired intricate borders on sleeves and cuffs and the invention of the colour wheel and new dye colours such as indigo allowed for a whole new array of beautifully coloured fabrics.

The exhibition also covered the more recent trends for garden-inspired garments including outfits by Vivienne Westwood (coupled with some gorgeous shoes) and an other-worldy anemone shaped dress by Alexander McQueen. Below are some (very poor quality) phone snaps I managed to take on the day, but I'd really recommend heading over there yourself if you get the chance. There is also a limited book of the exhibition which is lovely accompaniment. 

Have a great weekend! Xx