Familiar Views: Eric and James Ravilious
I'm keeping a running total of money saved:
Rude Britannia: £5
Toy Tales: £5.50
Familiar Views: £2.75
Total: £13.25
Or, I've got an Arts Fund membership, and I'm not afraid to use it. (Side note - their webpage takes a lot of navigating to get to the point where it actually mentions prices: Join Us, then Join Now, then the form. Even then, I don't know offhand how much I've paid... I suspect £44. So, a third of the way into profit.)
I'd come across Eric Ravilious last time I'd visited the Towner: a British artist and engraver, pupil of Paul Nash and war artist missing, presumed dead, at 39. I'd not known he had a son, James, who was an artist, and in particular a photography influenced by Cartier-Bresson, and was for 18 years a chronicler of rural Devon.
This conjunction is the strength and weakness of the exhibition: it firmly situates them in the British neo-romantic landscape tradition, and the influence of Samuel Palmer is clear on Eric. On the other hand, I'd like to see the war work (I gather there was an Imperial War Museum exhibition in 2004 - must track down a catalogue; I believe there is a new volume of this work coming in September). Whereas Eric work is more likely to contain machinery than humans, most of James's photographs include people in the landscape; I don't get a sense of what else he did. All of the images are black and white, through a yellow filter, framed within the camera, and he has a habit of shooting into the sun.
ETA: I need to dig into Peggy Angus; a new name to me. Bought a cottage at Furlongs, South Downs, which other artists visited. At RCA with Hepworth and Moore and Edward Bawden, another name that needs investigation.
Meanwhile, I ran into someone whose face I recognised, and he waylaid me; yes, I was right to recognise him. For better or worse, this might translate into a commission a couple of years down the line; a lot of work, but a reasonable amount of money if experience is anything to go by.
I'd left home at 7.30, so I managed to catch the 8.04 train, and the connection at Ashford was smooth, as it was on the return home. I reached Eastbourne at 9.40, found the library (one book, three dvds...) and did the specialty arcade and the charity shops. Into the shopping centre, which I neglected last time, but missed nothing. Coffee and reading in Nerd, then the rest of the charity shops (two James Bond videos; I can watch and discard if necessary). Then following the non-existent signs to to Towner - the Congress Theatre is in scaffolding, which is only a improvement. I didn't leave enough time for a second coffee, and hit the secondhand bookshop; I bounced off. Too much stock, not enough space, and I didn't fancy the basement. Headed home on the 17.09 train. The weather had started by being Novembery, mostly mizzle, thus an umbrella would have been a waste of time. The sun came out as I left the gallery; a little late.
Rude Britannia: £5
Toy Tales: £5.50
Familiar Views: £2.75
Total: £13.25
Or, I've got an Arts Fund membership, and I'm not afraid to use it. (Side note - their webpage takes a lot of navigating to get to the point where it actually mentions prices: Join Us, then Join Now, then the form. Even then, I don't know offhand how much I've paid... I suspect £44. So, a third of the way into profit.)
I'd come across Eric Ravilious last time I'd visited the Towner: a British artist and engraver, pupil of Paul Nash and war artist missing, presumed dead, at 39. I'd not known he had a son, James, who was an artist, and in particular a photography influenced by Cartier-Bresson, and was for 18 years a chronicler of rural Devon.
This conjunction is the strength and weakness of the exhibition: it firmly situates them in the British neo-romantic landscape tradition, and the influence of Samuel Palmer is clear on Eric. On the other hand, I'd like to see the war work (I gather there was an Imperial War Museum exhibition in 2004 - must track down a catalogue; I believe there is a new volume of this work coming in September). Whereas Eric work is more likely to contain machinery than humans, most of James's photographs include people in the landscape; I don't get a sense of what else he did. All of the images are black and white, through a yellow filter, framed within the camera, and he has a habit of shooting into the sun.
ETA: I need to dig into Peggy Angus; a new name to me. Bought a cottage at Furlongs, South Downs, which other artists visited. At RCA with Hepworth and Moore and Edward Bawden, another name that needs investigation.
Meanwhile, I ran into someone whose face I recognised, and he waylaid me; yes, I was right to recognise him. For better or worse, this might translate into a commission a couple of years down the line; a lot of work, but a reasonable amount of money if experience is anything to go by.
I'd left home at 7.30, so I managed to catch the 8.04 train, and the connection at Ashford was smooth, as it was on the return home. I reached Eastbourne at 9.40, found the library (one book, three dvds...) and did the specialty arcade and the charity shops. Into the shopping centre, which I neglected last time, but missed nothing. Coffee and reading in Nerd, then the rest of the charity shops (two James Bond videos; I can watch and discard if necessary). Then following the non-existent signs to to Towner - the Congress Theatre is in scaffolding, which is only a improvement. I didn't leave enough time for a second coffee, and hit the secondhand bookshop; I bounced off. Too much stock, not enough space, and I didn't fancy the basement. Headed home on the 17.09 train. The weather had started by being Novembery, mostly mizzle, thus an umbrella would have been a waste of time. The sun came out as I left the gallery; a little late.