Let me tell you, before anything else: I love London. And I adore travelling. The experience of being on a coach, among other students, and being stuck on the M6 while going South took me back years (my year of A-levels back in 1986), when I used to go fairly often to London.
And the city didn’t disappoint me. At all.
The autumn light, a bright blue sky, yellow leaves, buzzing people, the river. It was all there for me. So, this post is not going to be deep as in content as I would, because I could write pages and pages and never end being mesmerised. I turn into a little girl when I am down there: mouth wide open, full of wonder and mischief, a sense of deep emotional connection with everything and everyone. And I travel the city as if it had always been mine. This is what London does for me.
And, as I wrote, it did not disappoint me.
Tuesday afternoon I went to the Tate.
I know, one afternoon is not enough. I just got a flavour, an idea.

Composition B (II) – detail
But it also reminded me of a younger me, in the main hall, back in 1986, during a project for College: I sat there in that Hall for about 2 weeks, every day, in front of The Kiss. I find it amusing that by pure chance I ended up working for a collector specialised only in Rodin (and later Degas) some 20 years later… I know The Kiss in its every single little detail. And so Mondrian. Those were the two pieces closer to my heart back then. Those two pieces are the ones that formed me. And when I stood again, in front of Mondrian’s Composition B (II) I thought about me standing in front of the same work of art: I was even wondering if it recognised me, if it remembered me.
I took a lot from the visit at the Tate: the majesty of Turner’s work, his hand being so modern in some of his watercolours, the details of some of the paintings I have admired (pictures to follow below) and I have tried to concentrate again on patterns and techniques, this time. I have played with an easel leaving a sketch and then created a temporary mini-installation. But most of the time I was with the nose in the air, then on the floor, then looking at details: overflowing in me of emotions, colours, strokes, particulars, minutiae, boldness and exposition, in the true meaning of the word: the artist exposed, his soul there, bare, for all to see.
I also reverentially kneeled in front of a Ben Nicholson: me genuflected, signed of the Cross and status of Holiness and all. I was so in awe I forgot to take a picture (!).
Definitely, I want to go back. This was just a glance, nothing more than that.
But the sensation of standing there, physically, in front of these pieces which we normally read in books and see on Google: oh, the difference! The smell, of Art, in that place, the history! Me, Mesmerised! #gallery-488-3 { margin: auto; } #gallery-488-3 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 33%; } #gallery-488-3 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-488-3 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

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