At the risk of turning this blog into a rolling review of the London art scene, I must report that the exhibition Sickert In Venice at the Dulwich Picture Gallery is an absolute corker - if you can get there and haven't yet done so, I'd urge you not to miss it (you've got till the end of May, so plenty of time). Of course a trip to this particular gallery is always a joy, if only for the unique and wonderful architecture and the gems of the permanent collection (notably, for me anyway, the Rembrandts). But the Sickert exhibition is perfect for the setting, being small and perfectly formed, and yet encompassing the essence of Sickert - for the argument of the exhibition is that it was Venice, rather than London, that made Sickert the artist he was. It was in a succession of long stays in 'the loveliest city in the world' (as he aptly described it) in the 1890s and 1900s that all the key elements of his mature style and subject matter were formed. Venice - where, on his first long visit, in a dejected state and with his life and career stalled, he consciously set about remaking himself - was the source, the inspiration and the key to his artistic development. The case is persuasively made in a series of paintings (divided into Views and Vistas, Nocturnes and Portraits and Figures) of the light and dark, the inside and outside, the grand sights and backwaters of Venice that are in themselves a subtle and serious delight to the eye. What a painter - what an exhibition! Oh and the book that goes with it is excellent too.
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
Sickert In Venice
At the risk of turning this blog into a rolling review of the London art scene, I must report that the exhibition Sickert In Venice at the Dulwich Picture Gallery is an absolute corker - if you can get there and haven't yet done so, I'd urge you not to miss it (you've got till the end of May, so plenty of time). Of course a trip to this particular gallery is always a joy, if only for the unique and wonderful architecture and the gems of the permanent collection (notably, for me anyway, the Rembrandts). But the Sickert exhibition is perfect for the setting, being small and perfectly formed, and yet encompassing the essence of Sickert - for the argument of the exhibition is that it was Venice, rather than London, that made Sickert the artist he was. It was in a succession of long stays in 'the loveliest city in the world' (as he aptly described it) in the 1890s and 1900s that all the key elements of his mature style and subject matter were formed. Venice - where, on his first long visit, in a dejected state and with his life and career stalled, he consciously set about remaking himself - was the source, the inspiration and the key to his artistic development. The case is persuasively made in a series of paintings (divided into Views and Vistas, Nocturnes and Portraits and Figures) of the light and dark, the inside and outside, the grand sights and backwaters of Venice that are in themselves a subtle and serious delight to the eye. What a painter - what an exhibition! Oh and the book that goes with it is excellent too.
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I love Sickert!Patricia Cornwell doesn't seem to though :(
ReplyDeletebeautiful. was it cornwell who said he was Jack the Ripper? what do you think Nige? Was he? How could have time to splatter blood while also spreading so much paint (and the latter so fetchingly)?
ReplyDeleteNo don't worry Susan - a ludicrous theory, quite exploded now - he wasn't even in the country. I've always thought Dickens was more like murderer material, but no one's tried that theory yet, as far as I know - give it time...
ReplyDeletePatricia Cornwell should keep her forensically upholstered fictions to herself.....Hrumph
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