Grayson Perry at Serpentine Galleries (until 10 September 2017) Britain’s favourite transvestite potter and national treasure Grayson Perry RA once again casts his astute eye over contemporary society, its exigences and preoccupations, in a new summer show at the Serpentine Galleries in the heart of London’s Hyde Park. I am in the communication business and…
Author: ArtMuseLondon
ArtMuseLondon is a site for reviews of art exhibitions and music in London, and general cultural musings, written by people with a keen interest and an honest, accessible approach.
A Messiaen double bill at the Barbican
Messiaen L’Ascension Messiaen Turangalîla Symphony BBC Symphony Orchestra Sakari Oramo conductor Steven Osborne piano Cynthia Millar ondes martenot Wednesday 24th May 2017 The authors of ArtMuseLondon must confess to a certain fascination with the Ondes Martenot, that strange early electronic instrument which stars in Messiaen’s Turangalila Symphony. We first encountered the instrument at an earlier…
Giacometti at Tate Modern
Tate Modern is billing this exhibition as the first major retrospective of the Swiss artist Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) in Britain for 20 years. That’s a bit rich, given that in the past year alone there have been substantial shows devoted to his work at the National Portrait Gallery and at the Sainsbury Centre for Visual…
Pink Floyd: Their Mortal Remains – an immersive audio-visual experience
If an exhibition can illicit a Proustian Rush then the new homage to the legendary rock band Pink Floyd at London’s Victoria and Albert Museum did it for me. The opening bars of Wish You Were Here, a simple guitar riff, were enough to send me right back to my black beret-wearing teens, lying on…
A first quarter of fine concerts at St John’s Smith Square
Having declared that I intended to “do less” in 2017 to focus on more academic activities, my concert-going has been as busy as ever, and I have enjoyed some really fine performances in the first quarter of 2017. St John’s Smith Square (SJSS), now my favourite venue alongside the Wigmore Hall, is proving a rich…
A young pianist’s thoughts on late style
What is Late Style? It’s a question that has long preoccupied writers and thinkers, from Theodor Adorno to Edward Said. And now Jonathan Biss, an American pianist in his mid-30s, is exploring the concept of Late Style through a series concerts featuring a variety of composers and works. His second London concert was on 27th…
An added poignancy to Howard Hodgkin’s ‘Absent Friends’
Howard Hodgkin: Absent Friends – National Portrait Gallery, London The title of the National Portrait Gallery’s new exhibition of portraits by British artist Howard Hodgkin has an added poignancy: called ‘Absent Friends’, the show opens just two weeks after the artist died at the age of 84, and thus Hodgkin himself is an absent friend…
‘Partenope’ at English National Opera
English National Opera’s 2016/17 season closes with a welcome revival of Christopher Alden’s Olivier Award-winning 2008 production of G. F. Handel’s Partenope, first staged in 1730. The plot, daft even by Baroque comic opera standards, revolves around the mythical Partelope, Queen of Naples, and her multiple suitors. Awash with braggadocio, cross-dressing and sexual intrigue, Silvio…
Maurizio Pollini proves he still has the hunger
Whenever Italian pianist Maurizio Pollini comes to London there are the gainsayers who declare that he is now “past it”, that his technique is “not what it once was” (he’s in his 70s, so we can’t really expect the nimble fleet-fingers of a man half his age!). But go to one of his concerts and…
America after the Fall: Painting in the 1930s
The big draw at the Royal Academy’s new show is a truly iconic work of art: “American Gothic” by Grant Wood. It’s one of the most recognizable images in American painting: a stern-looking couple – actually posed by Wood’s sister Nan and his dentist, Dr. Byron McKeeby – stand in front of their Carpenter Gothic…
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