Art
Wednesday was mostly spent at the National Portrait Gallery, with Lauren, looking at their current exhibition of Indian portraits. I wouldn’t have thought of going to see this myself, although I did hear a radio programme about it last week, but it was very interesting indeed, and not too big, which is an excellent thing in any exhibition. I had gathered from the radio that it was a collection of contemporary portraits, but it turns out that there is a long-standing tradition of portraiture in Indian art, and the pictures dated from 1560 to 1860, and were firmly in the tradition of Indian miniature painting, which I love, but know next to nothing about. I love anything sharp, detailed and delicate in paintings, especially when they get the flowers and plants right, and these were wonderful. I’m no judge of portraiture, which is more Lauren’s thing, but they seemed to be genuine portraits, rather than just pictures of important people, and I was quite happy looking at the flowers. Several of the pictures were mounted on borders of coloured paper painted with delicate plant and animal designs, often just in gold or silver, so they could only be seen at an angle.
The best thing we saw, though, was a collection of paintings by two identical twin sisters, Amrit and Rabindra Singh, who have taken the same minutely detailed and sharp technique of traditional Indian miniatures, and used it for modern subjects. I couldn’t make out if they paint the same picture together or work separately - the pictures were labeled as being by either sister rather than both, but their styles seem indistinguishable. We both absolutely loved these, especially the more domestic pictures of family weddings and parties; the political paintings which make impressive, but less comfortable, comments on consumerism, sport and war. I’m not sure if their use of flowers and animals comes from traditional miniature painting, since I don’t know enough about the subject, but it is very striking, especially their use of flowers, which I do know about. Their big picture of Bush and Blair, Partners in Crime, features a lot of poisonous plants (aconite, morning-glory, hemlock) as well as their respective beasts, the hyena and the poodle. My favourite paintings were Les Girls, a wonderfully detailed picture of the artists and their friends relaxing at home, and Indian Summer at Dhigpal Nivas (not on their website), which shows the artists and their family and friends preparing a barbecue party in a marvellously-detailed garden, with tiny foxes, robins and so forth hidden among the flowers. The NPG website has quite a bit about the twins, but there is a lot more, and much better reproductions of the paintings, on
their own website. It’s a bit of a hobby-horse of mine, but this is the sort of modern figurative painting we never hear enough about because it isn’t part of the overhyped Saatchi-promoted New British Artists circus. Really, anyone who can get there should see both exhibitions. I may even go back again myself (since both are free).
It’s definitely spring now, and to prove it, here are the first flip-flops of spring, spotted in the NPG cafe, as well as some of the daffodils in my window-box (plus distant road-diggers. Happily, since today is Friday, they seem to have knocked off now.
The best thing we saw, though, was a collection of paintings by two identical twin sisters, Amrit and Rabindra Singh, who have taken the same minutely detailed and sharp technique of traditional Indian miniatures, and used it for modern subjects. I couldn’t make out if they paint the same picture together or work separately - the pictures were labeled as being by either sister rather than both, but their styles seem indistinguishable. We both absolutely loved these, especially the more domestic pictures of family weddings and parties; the political paintings which make impressive, but less comfortable, comments on consumerism, sport and war. I’m not sure if their use of flowers and animals comes from traditional miniature painting, since I don’t know enough about the subject, but it is very striking, especially their use of flowers, which I do know about. Their big picture of Bush and Blair, Partners in Crime, features a lot of poisonous plants (aconite, morning-glory, hemlock) as well as their respective beasts, the hyena and the poodle. My favourite paintings were Les Girls, a wonderfully detailed picture of the artists and their friends relaxing at home, and Indian Summer at Dhigpal Nivas (not on their website), which shows the artists and their family and friends preparing a barbecue party in a marvellously-detailed garden, with tiny foxes, robins and so forth hidden among the flowers. The NPG website has quite a bit about the twins, but there is a lot more, and much better reproductions of the paintings, on
their own website. It’s a bit of a hobby-horse of mine, but this is the sort of modern figurative painting we never hear enough about because it isn’t part of the overhyped Saatchi-promoted New British Artists circus. Really, anyone who can get there should see both exhibitions. I may even go back again myself (since both are free).
It’s definitely spring now, and to prove it, here are the first flip-flops of spring, spotted in the NPG cafe, as well as some of the daffodils in my window-box (plus distant road-diggers. Happily, since today is Friday, they seem to have knocked off now.