Just for the record

The sun definitely came out today.

I have proof.

Piano practice

I found this while clearing out my emails.

Flex your fingers while the ad is on,

it's worth the wait.

Lately

There have been visitors,

figs

wine

 cake

and games of Bananagrams.

Now everyone has scattered,

some as far as Hong Kong,

and it has snowed again.

Supper on a tray tonight.

A fish out of water

Do you ever feel like one?

The drizzle and grey have returned

and more Arctic blasting is confidently predicted

for the weekend.

I was working in the garden without a jumper on Monday,

batteries charging nicely.

Suffice it to say,

I am not in my element.

360 º

I won't take a camera I thought,

it'll just be in the way and

I don't want to carry a heavy bag.

So what did I decide to do on the spur of the moment

on this sunniest and clearest of Spring days?

I went up the Shard.

Probably the best blogortunity in London.

Well I looked with my eyes and not a lens

and it was just as you'd hope

a view from the 72nd level would be,

800 giddy feet in the air.

Little white trains slithered in and out of stations;

slipped past each other across bridges, 

curled away and converged with immaculate timing.

Boats large and small chugged up and down the river.

A police launch nosed importantly between the slower vessels.

Big Ben was tiny.

So was St. Paul's. 

The Thames takes a deeply sinuous route into the far distance

glinting upstream in the low sun,

broadening downstream towards Greenwich and the open sea.

But most beautiful of all was to see all around 
the rim of hills that hold London 
in their hazy and distant embrace.

The only jarring note was the quite unnecessary New Age muzak,

intended I suppose to heighten your wonderment.

At that height, with a slight breeze on my face,

blissfully removed from 

the blare of mobile phones and traffic,

it was silence I craved.

That would have made the Shard sublime.

Drawing back the curtain

People actually cheered.

It had to be this.

Just add a nought

Happy Birthday Philip.

(And let's hope you were six in that school photo,

not seven, or heaven forfend - 

eight!).

Now I must hurry away and make more chocolate-

related comestibles.

Culling

Can't linger.

I'm busy culling little books

and cooking for a big birthday.

Texture and pattern

This weekend.

Wasn't it glorious?

The rainbows are back

It's like sighting the first snowdrop

or the returning swifts

but trickier.

All elements have to be perfectly present

for the rainbows to appear.

Vigilance is all

because in a blink,

in the merest downward glance

to remove a lens cap,

they dissolve.

Art therapy

 The Wilton Diptych, Turner's Helvoetsluys,

anything by Van Gogh, (I rather favoured 

Still Life with quinces and lemons

in order to tempt Sue), and Velasquez's Crucifixion,

have each had votes so far.
Further nominations are for
The Graham Children by Hogarth and 
The Madonna with the Iris by Dürer.

None of the downloadable images did justice to them

so I have scanned a postcard of my tentative choice.

Despite Clark's assertion that the public did not want to see

Dutch painting or any realistic paintings, 

I see that in June 1942 they exhibited Pieter de Hooch's

A Woman and her Maid in a Courtyard

sadly not now on display, but I am frequently drawn to this:

and I think that amid the chaos of bombed-out,
blacked-out London,

I would have been happier to contemplate sunlit order

 than to wilt under the stern gaze

of Margharetha de Geer.

The inscription above the door translates as:

This is in Saint Jerome's vale, 

if you wish to repair to patience and meekness.

For we must first descend if we wish to be raised.

Blitz spirit

Whilst pondering the lowering effect of 

this long winter on the nation's spirits,

I found myself wondering how much harder it must have  been

to stay cheerful during World War II,

and yet we are portrayed in newsreels as a resilient and 

cheerful bunch even during the Blitz.

This British Council film is fairly typical:

http://film.britishcouncil.org/london-1942

The National Gallery in London had been putting on 

morale boosting concerts by Myra Hess since 1939, 

and visitors couldn't help noticing

the bare walls where pictures had been 

evacuated for safety to Wales.

It was decided that the public should have access to 

great pictures even in the most difficult circumstances.

Kenneth Clark said that the difficulties, 

'must be weighed against the delight and refreshment 

which the sight of a great picture would give'.

One picture was to be displayed every three weeks.

The Met Office weather report for February 1942

notes that the month was,
'remarkable for its persistently cold character'.
In England and Wales,
'sunshine was considerably below average on the whole;
in eastern districts it was particularly scanty'.

What did they choose for the aesthetic refreshment of Londoners?

Letters sent in by members of the public had made it,

'perfectly clear that people do not want to see Dutch painting

or realistic painting of any kind;

no doubt at the present time they are anxious to contemplate 

a nobler order of humanity'.

They chose the newly acquired portrait of 
Margaretha de Geer by Rembrandt.

She was the wife of a wealthy merchant Jacob Trip

who had made his fortune from mining,

manufacturing iron and trading with armaments.

She was displayed each day between January and March 1942
and placed in secure storage each night.
On a persistently cold day in February 2013

I stood myself in front of her.

The gallery was quiet, it was near closing time

and most of the visitors had been 

gently herded towards the exits.

We contemplated one another.

I could not honestly say I felt delighted.

In February 1943 they showed Constable's The Hay Wain.

Next time I visit, I am going to have to make my own selection.
Which National Gallery painting would lift your spirits?

Just add sun

It was a small hopeful sign yesterday.

Hopes dashed again with the reappearance of 

the dreariest sort of snow this morning.

Et lux perpetua

We're going to another performance of Mozart's Requiem tonight.

It's a new hobby. Requiem collecting.

Paperchase

This sweet film is blowing about the internet,

but my thanks to Isabelle's daughter 

for providing a link that worked.