art and food

Although I don't make resolutions, one thing I do tend to do in the new year is make a concerted effort to go to more exhibitions (which often peters out later in the year). I think one of the reasons is because lots of exhibitions seem to end at the start of the year. I've seen three exhibitions already, and intend to see two more this week, the Photographic Portrait Prize at the NPG, and Cold War Modern at the V&A, before it finishes on the 11th.

On New Year's Day, I went to see Aime Maeght & His Artists at the Royal Academy, which I would be recommending to you all if it hadn't closed on January 2nd. It was pretty good, though, with rooms organised by complementary artist pairs: Bonnard and Matisse; Miró and Calder; Braque and Giacometti. My favourite was the Miró and Calder room, which was full of exuberant colours and shapes, designed with humour and playfulness. It was a very uplifting thing to see on such a grey, cold day, and the two artists complemented each other very well.

There was also some film footage of the artists at work, and I was fascinated to see how considered and meticulous Giacometti was. His drawings look so effortlessly spontaneous and almost slapdash, but in fact he took his time working out exactly where each line would go. Discovering that was quite a revelation, and a new way to think about working. It's actually quite hard to take a long time to make something look effortless and still good.

In contrast to that, the following day I went to the Osbert Lancaster exhibition, which I really enjoyed, despite the fact that it was badly hung and the picture captions were really confusing, and recommend it if you're in the Bond Street area in the next week (it finishes on January 11th). I'm not sure how many others will appreciate the dated digs at moneyed establishment (which Lancaster was himself a member of), but fortunately there's more to the show than that. I particularly liked his elegant book jacket designs, which show off his skilled draughtsmanship, and wonderful use of colour and composition; and his witty illustrations of architectural design throughout the ages should be seen by anyone who has an interest in the urban environment (and his description of "Stockbrokers Tudor" is so much better than "mock Tudor"). There are also some brilliantly funny pastiches of portrait styles throughout the ages (his take on Cranach had me giggling particularly loudly), and some charming paintings of Egypt and Europe. It was fascinating to see the clever way he used the texture of the paper to create textures of buildings, which is something you never properly see in reproduction.

I was quite surprised that the exhibition was at the Wallace Collection (somewhere I'd been meaning to visit for years), as it seemed to be more suitable for somewhere like the Cartoon Museum, but in fact it was perfectly at home. Most of the people looking at the pictures looked as though they could have stepped off the page, and if Paul hadn't been so hungry, we would have loved to have stopped for a cream tea in the delightfully pink and posh tea room, and had a proper look around the rest of the House afterwards. Something to save for a rainy day, I guess.

We had quick, filling nosh-up at Bodean's, which is an okay but not brilliant American-style BBQ sandwich place, that massively overcharged me £2.50 (TWO! POUNDS! FIFTY!) for one regular can of non-imported ginger beer. And sadly I have to knock them off my list of potential places that do proper hash browns because they don't (they don't even serve the frozen potato cakes that people usually serve in place of proper hash browns). Nowhere does proper hash browns in London, so far as I can tell. Getting hushpuppies in London is even harder, but I started craving them in Bodean's and now I must find them!

We also took a look at the new Photographers' Gallery, the ground floor, anyway. The current Soho Nights exhibition is tiny but really interesting, and with some fantastic photos. It was fascinating to see Slim Hewitt's photos of people dancing to jazz in the 50s, because the women's clothes and hairstyles could have come from last year. The only thing that really dated the pictures was the men's hairstyles, in particular that floppy-fringed one that I always associate with Ian Carmichael in the film of Lucky Jim (see pic). There are also some brilliant candid photos by Ken Russell, which capture people in unintentionally hilarious poses, as they try to dance in a tiny club so crowded they can only hand-jive. (There's a good post about this over at History is made at night).

The other thing that interested me was a series of pictures which accompanied an article about Soho's Little France, which mainly congregated around one pub, called the York Minster, now more famously known as The French House (which has some nice photos on its website). Anyway, it's a fascinating little exhibition which really demonstrates that it's a subject which deserves to be in a bigger space, with a more in-depth overview. Maybe someone will curate one, one day.

After that, on to the original Amato in Old Compton Street (not the johnny-come-lately branch in Charlotte Street), because I've had a crazy craving for some of their insanely rich and almost hazelnutty hot chocolate, but their machine is still out of order, and will be for about a month, according to the waitress. Oh noes! Where do I go to satisfy that craving now?¹ But chocolate disappointment was smoothed away by the unexpected pleasure of bumping into Gaetan and his lovely fiancee (who is also called Anna). We were soon joined by Billy and had a very nice chat about Turbine Hall installations, pizza toppings, wedding cakes, wine tours and other cultural things, before they went off to the theatre and the three who were left went to The Red Lion in Duke of York Street, which one of my favourite central London pubs. It's tiny, but fabulous; full of Victorian mirrors, great real ale and St James' toffs. Real character.

¹ I did try the Old Compton Street branch of French chain Paul a few days ago, but it's bloody expensive and it certainly wasn't hot — it was lukewarm in fact, and if I hadn't bought it as a takeaway en route to somewhere else I would have complained, but I couldn't, so I complain here. It's my blog and I'll whine if I want to.