Strange time dropping picture to Atheneum. Took the 53 to Whitehall and it was terribly slow - the weather, the traffic and the crazy man at The Elephant - started to fear that I would be late. Didn't have the number of the man nor the club. Galloped from the bus stop and was pulled up by armed men as I was charging across the changing of the guard (had the hood of my coat up, didn't hear them shouting)
At the club, bang on time, the secretary took the pic and showed me where it would hang. He wants a ceremony - an unveiling- then to give me lunch. I asked if my siblings could come and he said all the siblings I wanted could come, probably unaware of how many there are :)
So all good but I was distrait. Tres. Had a coffee and was so uneasy I lidded it and went to the train station, got an immediate train out of town. Whence I felt well and happy.
There was a nasty nastiness in the air, is all I'm saying.
Here's the entrance of the Atheneum. The portrait will hang behind those pillars,on the way to the lift, opposite a pic of TS Eliot. Couldn't be better; though there is still a committee sitting to arrange the site so nothing settled really.
Whilst in London saw the Hockney show and was sadly underwhelmed. He's great, of course, but all that emphasis on surface is tiring - I want a pretense at depth. His drawing of Kitaj is inadequate. Woefully. Take a Hockney drawing and compare and contrast with a Turner daub....
Didn't get to the Claude Cahill/Gillian Wearing show, distinguished so far by carrying the worst reviews I've ever read. Instead went to the Rubens at The Banqueting House of Whitehall which was a blast but not on account of Rubens; it has been restored 25 times (and stuck on hardboard in 1926) so its as blurred as my spectacles.
Learnt a lot of new stuff.
Nicest thing I saw? This little beaut;
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