Tate, Oto

One Saturday I traveled to London by myself to meet some friends. I went early, and planned to walk the streets, visit the Tate Modern, and make my way slowly to Dalston for our scheduled evening. 

I took the Bakerloo line and got off at Picadilly Circus, confusing it with Leicester Square, and was initially pleased for nostalgic reasons - I used to work at Virgin Megastore Piccadilly many years ago. That said it was a nightmare, absolutely rammed with tourists. I took the Trocadero exit and walked down Shaftesbury Avenue, past stalls of tourist tatt and hordes of plodding idiots. I walked through Leicester Square, past more crowds, turning right towards the National Portrait Gallery. I crossed the road and walked through the pleasant and relative quiet of Cecil Court, admired the book stores and leafed through a few paperbacks on tables outside.

I walked past the Harp Bar, recalling many previous visits there, and up through Covent Garden, past the Porterhouse beer hall on Maiden Lane. Saint Martin in the Fields was to my right. On the STrand I ducked into the Coal Hole, packed with middle aged white tourists eating midday pub meals, and used their latrine. All this food made me realize how hungry I was.

I walked down through Embankment Gardens, climbed the stairs and crossed the bridge, which was closed to motor vehicle traffic to allow some kind of bicycle event to take place. Bikes were everywhere. I walked fast, eager to get over the river and out of the west end horror. On the Southbank I entered the National Theatre cafe and bought a double machiato. Further along I saw a food truck and bought some chips, so trashy that no amount of salt could make them taste of anything. 

Finally reaching the Tate, my bag was searched - a novelty - and I wandered in the Turbine Hall. I made my way to the Vaults and explored this whole new side to the gallery.

Among the interesting works I viewed were:

- Jenny Holzer neon language work

- Stephen Shore photography

- The small 'Unofficial Actions' exhibition

Ana Lupus - 'The Solemn Process'

Aldo Mireiles - 'Babel'

Suzanne Lacy - 'The Crystal Quilt'

Victor Pivovarov 

  Helio Oiticica - 'Tropicalia'

After exploring the new side to the Tate quite thoroughly I was exhausted, but still spent some time in the bookshop. I was particularly intrigued by books on Brion Gysin, Leonora Carrington and  Naoya Hatekeyama.

Back outside the streets and pavements were still frantic, especially when winding my way through Borough Market (although all the burgers and pulled pork sandwiches looked incredible), but I finally reached London Bridge and got on a train to Canada Water. There I changed to the Overground, to Dalston Junction. Here it was refreshingly unpopulated by tourists (despite myself), and I wandered until I found Cafe Oto where I needed to go. 

I met friends, beers were drunk and laffs were had. We discussed Shane MacGowan, Frances Farmer, exotica, and chicken wings. We were here for a showcase of the Chocolate Monk label and we saw two acts. The first was far too po-faced and offered nothing that I hadn't seen done better twenty years ago. The next with label head Dylan Nyoukis himself and 4 other characters was properly amuising and I laughed and laughed.  

Here's Dylan Nyoukis solo from last year in a totally different context.

Capital City Museums

We decided one day to visit some of the museums in London, those larger Capital City versions of the ones we had visited frequently in our town. Specifically, the Museum of Natural History Science Museum. Again, it was a hottie. Visits to London are quite costly undertakings for a family - both financially (transport, food, drinks, souvenirs) and physically. There is much travel, much walking, much standing in frequently hot and airless spaces, and endless conversation with the youngsters. That said, this visit turned out to be a very fine day indeed.

I prepared snacks and sandwiches and packed them in my rucksack, with water bottles, pencils and paper, phones and chargers. At around 9.30am we left our house, walked down the road to the nearby bus stop and boarded the first bus. The bus stop is close, less than 5 minutes walk, and buses are frequent. We got off at the stop on the road above the train station, walked down, bought train tickets, then waited for the train. The train from Oxford Parkway to London Marylebone takes about an hour. It is a very comfortable train, with air conditioning, diner-style seating enabling the four of us to sit comfortably together, WiFi and electricity sockets enabling the charging of phones. Unfortunately there is no dining car. We sat down at a diner table, the children did colouring or iPad zonking while we stared happily at the rolling fields outside the window. Invariably many of the snacks I had packs were eaten on the train.

From Marylebone we got the tube to High Street Kensington (a bespoke stop for tourists, like us, for a number of museums and the Royal Albert Hall), involving a couple of changes and some confusion over the Circle/District lines, but we were there fairly quickly. We walked through the subway with direct access to each of the museums, and headed straight to the Victoria and Albert Museum. This is one of A's favourite destinations and we have often been there together, and it's impossible to turn down when in this part of town.

The sun was shining and the children could not resist joining the many other children in the fountain, after a visit to the cafe.

The V&A was packed, as it was the height of summer, holidays for many Europeans and so near to the British school holidays. A number of special exhibitions are on to cater to the season. We naively tried to get tickets for the well publicised Frida Kahlo exhibition but no dice, so we went along to the Fashion and Nature show. On the ground floor were a selection of historic garments featuring animals prominently, and also discussing the ways in which various items were created. Through loudspeakers throughout the exhibition, sounds of clothing being manufactured, or sounds of the animals used in their creation, were piped through.

Upstairs, the show focused on contemporary fashion and the environmental costs. I learned that fashion is the world's second most polluting industry, after fossil fuels. 

I. particularly enjoyed a short film, featuring three screens synchronised, depicting scenes of the natural world, the clothing industry, and environmental damage. It was refreshingly not didactic and the damage aspects were subtly deployed. It was mostly a beautiful film and very easy to get lost in, with I. viewing it several times as it looped.

After an obligatory visit to the gift shop, where we purchased the catalog and trinkets for the children, we headed to the Natural History Museum. Outside we witnessed a road accident right before our eyes, as a motorcyclist collided with a police car that turned incorrectly at a busy intersection. The motorcyclist rolled over the roof of the police car and wandered over to where we were standing, leaning on a rail and seeming quite shaken. The - guilty - police left their vehicle, both carrying heavy machine guns, and went over to the motorcyclist, presumably - hopefully? - to help him. It was a confusing and disturbing scene.

After more caffeine we wandered lost looking for a bathroom. We only found one in the basement, stuck in the school zone, after much walking past fossils and dinosaur skeletons. 

... and pictures of birds.

We then headed into the volcano section, up an escalator through a giant globe. There we walked through crowded narrow corridors learning about volcanoes, the earth's interior and earthquakes.

We bemoaned the fact the the best part of the Natural History Museum - the huge central atrium - had been removed, only to later realise we had missed it completely. We were through with museums by that point anyway.

So we walked up the street towards Kensington Gardens to go to the Serpentine Gallery.

I had often admired this apartment block on previous visits to the area.

In the Serpentine itself was this gigantic installation by Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Initially nonplussed, I came to love it after learning about their investigations into the Mastaba. 

More water frolicking, this time in the Princess Diana Gardens. Here, with my feet in the water, particularly triggered by the image of a distant block of flats overlooking the park, I became particularly homesick for London.

It is the season for the Serpentine Pavilion, presented this year by Mexican architect Frida Escobedo, astonishingly the first female to design a pavilion for the Serpentine. Escobedo's design featured walls made of roof tiles and smooth concrete flooring with reflective puddles of water.

The Gallery is devoted to Christo and Jeanne-Claude's investigations into the Matsaba. This included their model for a giant Matsaba made of over 2 million oil drums for the desert of the United Arab Emirates. 

Again, the grass of the gardens is burnt.

The bird on the third post along was poised to take off for a long time, flapping its wings but going nowhere.

The apartment block which inexplicably triggered such longing.

A wonderful but exhausting day. Leaving the park I photographed this building which I remember well from when we lived nearby 11 years ago.

A Day in the Capital

We decided to visit the capital and meet some of my relatives, in the pleasant leafy suburb in which they live. It was the first wet day we had encountered (and remains so some weeks later), which made our choice of meeting spot - an open park with ponds - less than ideal. The rain did not last however, and we were prepared with rain jackets. 

At the pond the evidence of spring was in abundance, with baby birds of numerous varieties, including cygnets:

We were quite taken with this striking Mandarin Duck. I imagine it's delicious. It certainly makes its humdrum neighbour here look unremarkable.

After the pond we walked through a number of pleasing narrow lanes.

This house may belong to a Doctor, who seems to have made some strange effort with their front door design.

We visited my family's allotment, where strawberries were flourishing, and delicious.

In the bird feeder we spied a lorikeet, very far from home.