Everyone here talks/complains about the weather constantly, so I may as well, too. It pretty much sucks. Arrival day was sunny, but windy and a bit chilly. Friday was very windy, grey, somewhat damp and COLD. I spent the day walking around Islington, with runny nose and watery eyes most of the time. But it was an enjoyable walk that included Camden Passage Market (not much going on there on Fridays), lunch at the S&M (Sausage and Mash) Cafe, another Banksy, and a nice little gallery of Italian art called the Estorick Collection.
After finishing with Islington, I took the overground to Finchley and Frognal and walked down the Finchley Road to catch the bus to St John's Wood to meet Spooner at his school. As luck would have it, I saw a charity shop and got a warm scarf for 2 pounds. At Spooner's school, we went to a concert that the kids were doing as a fundraiser for a school in Kenya, and then had dinner at the Princess of Wales pub in Primrose Hill.
Grey, cool and damp again on Saturday, but we were able to do most of what I had planned (a graphic art exhibit called AgitPop at the London Print Studio and the Camden Town Group painters at the Tate Britain), with the exception of the stroll around Chelsea -- when we got to the Royal Hospital, the rain that had been threatening all day started for real and the grounds of the hospital had just closed for the day, so we skipped that as well as Cheyne Walk and headed for a caff instead. The day ended with a concert of Welsh choirs at Cadogan Hall in Sloane Square -- some fine voices, but a very odd assortment of numbers, many sung in a language consisting mainly of G and W and totally without vowels, and a lot of stuff about the Risen Lord and Amen, Amen, Amen. The popular numbers were the strangest -- the theme from The Rose, Love is a Many Splendored Thing, When You Walk Through a Storm, and -- weirdest of all for us Yankees -- Elvis' American Trilogy of Dixie, the Battle Hymn of the Republic, and All My Trials.
Today, we're heading to Moorgate where we'll begin a walk around Smithfield Market and various dark and mysterious alleys in the City. It's somewhat warmer and not raining yet, but still grey. I guess you just learn to live with it.
End-of-day update: The afternoon turned out to be sunny and nice, so after the City walk we went to Covent Garden Market (ScribeGirl and rosenbeans will be happy to hear that I scored the soap and tea for them), walked through the Embankment Garden, and did a little food shopping in Chinatown.
Hey Mates! I arrived in London at 7 a.m. this morning and walked in the door of Spooner's house at 10. A long but uneventful trip. After taking a quick nap and shower, I headed into town to meet one of my Flickr mates at the Royal Academy of Arts to see "From Russia," an amazing exhibition of French and Russian masters, mostly impressionist and post-impressionist, from the Russian collections (i.e. stuff that was in private hands until the Russian Revolution when the state seized it all). Virtually none of this stuff has been out of Russia since, and Putin almost didn't let it out for the exhibition.
Afterwards, we walked up to Newman Street to see the newest Banksy. It's fab.
Then, I came back to Belsize Park and did some shopping -- soap (forgot mine, don't like Spooner's), cello tape (for wrapping prezzies), the essential HobNobs, and some cake for Spooner's birthday. Prezzies are now wrapped and he should be home any minute. Tomorrow, Islington (weather permitting).
There's been some heated discussion of Banksy lately in my Flickr groups, with threads like Is Banksy Rubbish? and Is Banksy's Work Art or Vandalism? Yes, he's a vandal, and yes, his work is overrated, overexposed and overpriced. But that doesn't excuse this recent act of vandalism down in Brighton, where his kissing coppers have been blanked out with black paint by person or persons unknown, which seems not only anti-Banksy but anti-gay as well. I hope they nick the little wankers what done this.
Despite all the ranting (mine included), I still love those rats. And I envy anyone who bought prints for £95.
It seems like such a short time between my initial enchantment with Banksy and his fall from grace in my eyes. I first stumbled upon pictures of his street art on Flickr when I was doing research on London and Brighton for my trip. I thought he was great -- his biting social commentary, amusing and/or powerful images, the subversive way he worked (stenciling on walls by night, sneaking his own works into museums and hanging them by day).
When Spooner asked me this summer what I wanted to do when I came across the pond, my immediate reply was "Look for Banksies." "Banksy," he growled. "What's Banksy?" I explained and the next thing I knew he was sending me a link to a front page article in the NYTimes about the opening of Banksy's show in Los Angeles. Clearly, my say-so that something is cool means nothing, but the NYTimes has all the cred in the world.
We did have a great time looking for Banksies, and we found three -- one in Southwark, one in Chalk Farm, and one in Brighton. We also discovered a gallery in Brighton that sells limited edition prints. The three ghetto rats that were on display in the window drew us in and we talked for a while with the gallery owner. He told us that a Banksy print that went a year ago for £95 would fetch over a thousand quid today. Unbelievable!
In the gallery, we also looked at prints by some up-and-coming graphic artists. When he saw me looking at several postage stamp prints, the gallery guy told me about James Cauty, a musician-turned-artist. He creates stamps of mass destruction -- satirical pieces about the war, the monarchy, global warming, and the roles the US and the UK are playing in All Things Evil. He's run afoul of the Royal Mail with his stamps depicting Queen Elizabeth wearing a gas mask. One of his series is about 5/ll, the day Guy Fawkes tried to blow up Parliament. Another, called America Self Destruct, shows Bugs Bunny with dynamite strapped to his waist and a detonator in his hand. Dolk Lundgren, a Norwegian street artist similar to Banksy, has done a great print of Prince Charles wearing a Burger King crown. All brilliant stuff, and still (somewhat) affordable.
So, what's my beef with Banksy? He started out as an artist of The People, going about at night with spray paint and stencils, giving the masses of London something to look at, think about, or be amused by on their daily journeys around the city. Now, he's the darling of the celebrities, and Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie pay tens of thousands of dollars for his works, which they will hang on their private walls in their guarded homes, kept far away from the grit of the streets and The People. But the power and the joy of his images comes from seeing them in the context of those streets. These aren't so much fixed images as they are temporal and transitory ones. How they are seen and perceived varies with the day, the weather, the traffic, the news, the crowds. The images change over time as they fade, are painted out by building owners or tagged over by other graffiti artists. Hiding Banksy away in the homes of the stars is just wrong.
I've made it to the UK and, except for a to-the-skin drenching on my first day when I was locked out of Roger's house on account of having a bogus key, things are going great. We've walked miles and miles and I have blisters on my feet to prove it. Thankfully, they have special plasters for blisters here.
Here's a quick list of what we've seen and done so far:
Today and tomorrow I'm on my own. The weather has been most cooperative, but today's it's raining again so my plan is to do some museums. Tomorrow the sun should be out and I'll be taking the Docklands Light Rail down to Greenwich.
Further reports to come.
