October 09, 2005
Henri Cartier-Bresson
Wonderful exhibition at the Dean Gallery in Edinburgh. Many of the photographs are familiar but it was fascinating to see them alongside less well-known images.
If someone asks me in 20 years time what the 20th-century looked like, I’ll probably say “Cartier-Bresson!”. It is all there: the topical and the timeless, the political and the apolitical, the famous and the unknown, the rich and the poor, the east and the west, the north and the south.
Posted by Simon Holledge at 08:17 PM | TrackBack
September 28, 2005
'Gauguin's Vision'
The National Gallery of Scotland hosts a major exhibition each year to coincide with the festival. Unfortunately they have been becoming less and less major each year.
The 2003 ‘Monet: the Seine and the Sea’ in the (re-opened and splendidly reorganized) Royal Scottish Academy was a fine exhibition, including paintings from a number of galleries in Europe and America. ‘The Age of Titian’ in 2004 was interesting though it had less ‘Titian’ and more of ‘the age’ than expected, with relatively few paintings from outside the collection.
‘Gauguin’s Vision’ was more disappointing. It was not devoted to his ‘vision’ as an artist, but to a specific painting, the ‘Vision of the Sermon’, already in the Scottish collection. Only a handful of additional paintings were sourced from outside the collection. “Is that it?”, I asked the attendant as I finished the last gallery. He seemed used to the question.
Note to the National Gallery: please don’t film while the public are in the galleries, OK? Making a lot of noise, obstructing access to the paintings with camera equipment, using onlookers as extras etc. is not the best way to encourage attendance.
Posted by Simon Holledge at 10:08 PM | TrackBack
August 06, 2005
Cartier-Bresson exhibition
Edinburgh doesn’t have a lot of exhibitions but it has had some spectacularly good ones coinciding with the festivals.
The exhibition of the work of the great French ‘humanist’ photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004) at the Dean Gallery opened today and continues until 23 October.
news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1104&id=1735632005
www.hubtickets.co.uk/show.asp?code=1956
Posted by Simon Holledge at 10:51 AM | TrackBack
May 01, 2005
Labour fail Scottish arts
Sean Connery is attacking Labour’s lamentable record in the arts. He points out that we have had six arts ministers since devolution and none of them have acheived anything. The focus of his complaint is frustration over the delays in getting the Scottish National Photography Centre (SNPC) established in the former Royal High School on Edinburgh’s Calton Hill, despite a generous grant from Sony.
Ian Rankin’s broader criticism of arts policy is also quoted in the article by William Lyons:
The cultural strategies do not seem to be leading anywhere. What the art world desperately wants is decisions to be made and a minister who is going to stick around for more than 12 months.
We need continuity in this young Parliament. But what are we on now, our sixth cultural minister. We need someone who has experience of the arts world and you only get that with time.
Meanwhile we see other smaller countries doing much more with the arts. Look at Wales and their brand spanking new opera house. In Scotland we don’t even have an opera chorus. We spend too much time squabbling and shoot ourselves in the foot before we start.
And as I have argued before, Scotland needs a new national theatre and opera house as a focus for the performing arts in Scotland, to provide facilities to attract leading foreign companies to Scotland and revive the floundering Edinburgh International Festival.
As Connery points out [Labour] “talk about education, education, education” but the arts are for all, not just for reluctant (?) school kids. The arts can be influential in every aspect of our national life. Standards of literacy (traditional, visual and computer), communication skills, design sense etc. should be set in the arts world and applied in our economic, social and political (!) life.
The arts are also good value for money. Scottish artists, particularly performing artists, have a record of excellence that should be the envy of other sectors of the economy. We should be investing in them and in Scotland’s future as a leading European centre for the arts.
news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=465862005
Posted by Simon Holledge at 12:19 PM | TrackBack
April 10, 2005
East Neuk Festival
There is a new arts festival in Fife that has grown out of a series of concerts given by the excellent Scottish Chamber Orchestra.
The East Neuk Festival which takes place from 30 June to 3 July in Kilconquhar, Dunino, St Andrews, St Monans, Crail, and Elie. It features chamber music by Mozart and Schubert.
Posted by Simon Holledge at 07:08 PM | TrackBack
March 05, 2005
Raeburn or Danloux?
Curators at the National Gallery of Scotland now think that the famous picture of ‘Rev Walker Skating on Duddingston Loch’ may be by Henri-Pierre Danloux rather than Sir Henry Raeburn. Interesting, but does this matter one wonders? It’s a good picture whoever painted it.
However Liberal Democrat MSP Jamie Stone - apparently not a trained art historian - has declared it is “definitely” a Raeburn. Not the first time, or doubtless the last, that we have an MSP out of his depth (see also 13 February).
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/4315433.stm
UPDATE 15 March 2005
Now another art historian, Duncan Thomson, formerly of the National Portrait Gallery, is arguing for the Raeburn attribution!
thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=280012005
Posted by Simon Holledge at 06:06 PM | TrackBack
January 22, 2005
Value of Edinburgh Festival
A report in the Scotsman by Edward Black confirms what we already knew - that the summer festivals in Edinburgh generate a lot of money. The figure given is 135 million pounds. This stands in stark contrast to the funding of a meagre 2.5 million that the leading International Arts Festival receive.
I believe Edinburgh is in danger of cooking the goose than lays the golden eggs. Time is running out for Edinburgh to invest in better facilities. In particular we need a proper national theatre complex similar to the one recently opened in Cardiff. Each year the British media do a sterling job in hyping up the festival, but more and more people see through it. Edinburgh may be a beautiful city, but wouldn’t we rather be at festivals in Salzburg, Lucerne or Aix-en-Provence?
Edinburgh continues to do some things well, but the International Festival has lost much of its prestige. It is no longer in the same league as the main European Festivals which are coherently planned and present their own (original) events. Edinburgh programmes are haphazard with artists often appearing simply to double up on performances in London.
There is a lot more to the summer activities than just the International Arts Festival, but the lack of facilities that limit the latter also impact on many other events, and the reputation of one festival affects all of them.
thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=73702005
Posted by Simon Holledge at 10:30 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
January 16, 2005
Don Quixote
Today is the 400th anniversary of the publication date of the first section of Cervantes’ Don Quixote - one of my favourite novels.
I have an old battered copy full of yellow highlighting, but I can’t find it, it must be in Tokyo. A pity, if I had it, I’d look up some of the passages that I found particularly striking.
books.guardian.co.uk/departments/classics/story/0,,1389868,00.html
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4179869.stm
Posted by Simon Holledge at 01:54 PM | TrackBack
October 26, 2004
Hands off the Edinburgh Queen's Hall!
The Queen’s Hall have just launched an appeal. They explain:
“The Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh is entering an exciting new phase of development as the board and management consider the possibility of a new building or substantial redevelopment of the existing site of Clerk Street.
The board have engaged Richard Murphy Architects to develop a feasibility study to consider the needs of The Scottish Chamber Orchestra who are based here and also the requirements of our business to provide facilities fit for the 21st Century thereby improving conditions for concert promoters, artists and the concert going public.”
The phrase ‘fit for the 21st Century’ is particularly ominous. There have been few improvements in acoustics since the 19th century. Most of the world’s finest recital and concert halls and opera houses were built more than 100 years ago. The Queen’s Hall itself has superb acoustics. With 850/900 seats, it is perfect for chamber music, recitals and popular music. It is a historic building, constructed in 1823 and it should be preserved not ‘redeveloped’.
The needs of concert promoters (presumably for more seats) should not be prioritized over those of the public. If Edinburgh needs a concert hall with 1,200 or 1,400 seats, then a new one should be built, though I would argue that we already have an excellent concert venue in the Usher Hall, and what we really need is a multi-purpose national theatre/opera house with 2,000 seats.
Regarding the Queen’s Hall, i will not be responding to any appeal for money until the board and management undertake to maintain the auditorium in its present form and not make any unnecessary and harmful structural changes.
www.queenshalledinburgh.co.uk/
www.richardmurphyarchitects.com/
Posted by Simon Holledge at 02:04 PM | TrackBack
October 18, 2004
Wales Millennium Centre
Given a choice, would you give Scotland a new parliament building or a new arts complex?
An unfair question perhaps . . . Nevertheless I would have opted for the arts complex, or rather four of them. One for Edinburgh, one for Glasgow, one for Aberdeen, one for Inverness (or should it be Dundee?) - each with two theatres, one state-of-the-art lyric theatre with 1,850 seats and a studio theatre with 250. What a difference that would have made to the arts in Scotland!
The Wales Millennium Centre opens on 26 November. It cost 104 million. Maybe we could use it for the Edinburgh Festival? No, maybe I shouldn’t have written that . . . .
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/3710244.stm
Posted by Simon Holledge at 11:29 PM | TrackBack
October 07, 2004
Giving culture a higher priority
On September 12, I wrote, in relation to the SNP shadow cabinet appointments, that culture should have its own representative, rather than being a combined brief with sport.
According to Tim Cornwell’s article in the Scotsman (on the replacement of Frank ‘Piegate’ McAveety by Patricia Ferguson), quite a lot of people have similar ideas.
news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1160892004
Posted by Simon Holledge at 09:35 PM