2006 Roundup

Well that's it for the year. In the spirit of rounding up, here are my pretentious lists for the year (they tend to be what sprang to mind, and in no particular order):

Art exhibitions (post 1900ish)
1. Modernism, V&A, London
2. Giacometti, AGNSW, Sydney
3. Dan Flavin, Hayward, London
4. Albers and Moholy-Nagy, Tate Modern, London
5. Derain: London Paintings, Courtald, London

Art exhibitions (pre 1900ish)
1. Gothic Nightmares, Tate Britain, London
2. Rodin, Royal Academy, London
3. Velazquez, National Gallery, London
4. Constable, Tate Britain, London
5. Goya Etchings, Museo des Bellas Artes, Vittoria

Art exhibitions (contemporary):
1. Venice Biennale
2. David Hockney, Nat Portrait Gallery, London
3. Summer Exhib, Royal Academy, London
4. Architecture at Night, Kunstmuseum Stuttgart
5. Salon de Refuses, SH Ervin Gallery, Sydney

Photography/film exhibitions
1. The Past from Above, British Museum, London
2. Lee Friedlander, Haus der Kunst, Munchen
3. Sam Taylor-Wood, MCA, Sydney
4. Piero Paolo Pasolini, Pinakothek der Moderne, Munchen
5. Photographic Portrait Prize, AGNSW, Sydney

Art exhibitions (overall/misc.)
1. Russia!, Guggenheim, Bilbao
2. Modernism, V&A, London
3. Self Portrait, AGNSW, Sydney
4. Kunst Lebt!, Kunsthalle, Stuttgart
5. Venice Biennale

Art museums visited (pre-1900 collections):
1. Villa Borghese, Roma
2. Uffizi, Firenze
3. Alte Pinakothek, Munchen
4. National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh
5. Lady Lever Gallery, Port Sunlight

Art museums visited (post-1900 collections):
1. Museum Ludwig, Koln
2. Guggenheim, Venezia
3. Neue Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart
4. Fondation Beyeler, Basel
5. Pinakothek der Moderne, Munchen

Museums visited (overall experience):
1. Guggenheim, Bilbao
2. Neue Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart
3. Burrell Collection, Glasgow
4. Tinguely Museum, Basel
5. Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munchen

Churches visited:
1. Hagia Sofia
2. Canterbury Cathedral
3. Cologne Cathedral
4. Blue Mosque, Istanbul
5. Durham Cathedral

Castles/stately homes visited:
1. Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire
2. Audley End, Essex
3. Kishiwada Castle, Japan
4. Leeds Castle, Kent
5. Castle Rising, Norfolk

Books read (non-fiction):
1. Felipe Fernandez Armesto: Millennium
2. Edmund White: The Farewell Symphony
3. Pin Yathay: Stay Alive, My Son
4. Niall Ferguson: The Cash Nexus
5. Jared Diamond: Guns, Germs and Steel

Books read (fiction):
1. Alan Hollinghurst: The Line of Beauty
2. Lionel Shriver: We need to talk about Kevin
3.
4. I need to read more novels.

Topics I've learnt the most about:
1. Project finance
2. Climate change
3. English history
4. Dynamic deformation of lattice structures
5. Hedge funds

It's been an interesting year, fair share of ups and downs; I'm looking forward to a bit more strategic/coherent direction in 2007.

Christmas

Disclaimer: Blogger is being slightly uncooperative with regards to the uploading of photos. Accordingly, I shall fill posts with descriptive prose until i've decided whether to adopt a better way of posting pix, move to MySpace or other course of action. More pix are posted on facebook if you're just dying for them.

That said, this year's Christmas celebrations did not yield as many classic snaps as last year so not so much to miss out on pictorially.

Went to London on the 23rd, had lunch with some Micromechanics friends, went to a photo exhibition "In the face of history" at my new favourite London multimedia arts venue The Barbican, did some last minute shopping on Chrissy eve then enjoyed roast pork and mulled wine at Tam and Ben's new Fulham multimedia arts venue The Harwood Arms, Xmas day biiiiig lunch (no turkey necks i'm afraid), rode bike via the City, Bankside, South Bank, Pimlico, Chelsea Embankment to Lavender Hill to see out remainder of Christmas with Kylie and Anthony, rode back on Boxing Day via [as above in reverse] except i went past Southwark Cathedral and across Tower Bridge, went to Photographic Portrait Prize at National Portrait Gallery and checked out rehung 19c paintings "Manet to Picasso" at National Gallery - very nicely set out downstairs in Sainsbury wing. Jumped back in the saddle unhindered by additional acquisitions of booksale booty, and rode at breakneck speed along Shaftesbury Ave, Bloomsbury St and Euston Rd all the way to King's X, then, without showing any sign of slowing let alone dismounting, rode right out along platform 8 through to platform 11b and onto the train where I was swiftly and conveniently brought to a halt by a strategically positioned drinks trolley.

Two London Weekends

Went to the Christmas party of the firm I'm joining in April which was a lovely affair - excellent to meet some more of my future colleagues in such convivial surrounds. Following day went to Wallace Collection, saw the exhibition of drawings from Versailles, then to Tate Mod for David Smith sculpture exhib.

Following day, MJ and I went with people from the London Art Club on a tour of several galleries in the East End. They were cool. The galleries, that is. The people were, on average, kinda cool - the organiser James is very cool plus he has a cool bike.

The first place we went to, the Three Dogs Lane gallery, was in an industrial estate, inside a great big rusty building. MJ and I were slightly late and, after receiving instructions by phone ("it's inside the industrial estate on three dogs lane, after that it's really hard to find, there are some arrows but it's really complicated, good luck"), we had to navigate through a series of staircases and corridors til we finally found the gallery. I was reminded of Lynn Barber's article in the observer about how much fun she had as a Turner Prize judge. Describing finding galleries:
"Many of them were shut; a lot were simply unfindable, even with a map. (It is part of the mystique of 'edgy' galleries to hide in warehouses and lock-ups with no visible means of ingress.)"
Molto authentico.

Checked out Vyner St, supposedly highest concentration of galleries in London. "Vyner Street in Hackney is supposed to contain a dozen galleries but even after a year I only found six."

We saw six without looking too hard so i don't know what she was on about. Quite a cool range of exhibitions: best one was pictures of monkeys.

Here's Vyner st on a slightly more appealing day. Pretty unassuming.

The next week we had a Micromechanics end-of-year dinner - not too Christmassy (i.e. at a curry house) but most enjoyable.

Back to London the next morning with the culture-vulture A-team. First stop British Museum.

Saw an exhibition "The Past from Above", spectacular aerial photographs by Georg Gerster of archaeological sites all around the world. Great to be able to see the photos of the sites then go downstairs and check out artifacts from many of them also.

Went to Somerset House to see Courtald Collection, then over to the East India Club to reminisce about the last days of the Raj, what what. Here the chaps assemble for a group portrait photogram - all boys, because girls aren't allowed - and rightly so.

Went to see The Mousetrap - longest running play in the West End (and holder of that title for some 35 years now). It's worth seeing for that reason, and not many others. The guy behind us snoring loudly in the first half evidently concurred. Concluded evening with trail of debauchery leading from Clapham Common to Hackney Town Hall via the Tower of London and St Katherine's docks.

Went to the Rodin exhibition at the Royal Academy, one of the best exhibitions i've been to this year - and quite a few real works of art ;) too, before heading home (via Sainsbury's in Angel as i'd left things a little late for the early-closing shops of rural Cambridge) to cook a dinner party: Thai crab and prawn salad, Moroccan lamb shanks with lemon, olives and couscous.

Spontaneous Cultural Day

We'd held high aspirations of visiting the Wren Library one Saturday lunchtime and, accordingly, assembled dutifully in front of Trinity College tremulously excited about the forthcoming serious manuscript-admiration-action. Unfortunately, term was deemed to have finished the day before so that the opening times had changed in our disfavour.

Not ones to waste an opportunity of being up and about, we visited Great St Mary's church and went up the tower to enjoy the view. Unfortunately my own view was hampered somewhat, my glasses having been yoinked off my head by some drunken idiot whilst quietly standing in the queue minding my own business at the local kebabomatorium. Said drunken idiot capered off with them and, by the time I realised ( i was in fact slightly distracted hailing a pair of popsies with whom i'd become vaguely acquainted in similarly salubrious circumstances earlier in the week), disappeared. Suffice to say, my appetite for doner and taramosalata, usually insatiably hearty, was instantaneously quelled and, after a fruitless search for the spectacles, I departed in disgust. Fortunately, my companions, Ben and Ellie, were kind enough to describe the surrounding landscape in sufficient detail and such poetically descriptive terms that I almost felt like I could actually see it myself!

This is Gonville and Caius, the third richest college in Cambridge. Note pink knickerbockers hanging from window to left of tower - feisty.

This is the Senate House, and the University Library in the background.

The latter sparked an interchange regarding the aesthetic qualities of functional Art Deco, which provoked me to make the first of what was to become my catchcry remark for the day "When I was in...(insert travel destination and corresponding pretentious observation here)", in this case Liverpool and a note upon the magnificence of the Art Deco styled Mersey tunnel chimney vent near the Liver Building.

Here's market square looking very colourful:

Here i'm about to launch into another monotribe "when i was in..."

The bookshop in the church was having a sale so we picked up some amazing books at knock-off prices. Titles included: East Anglia from Above, Castles from Above, London from Above, Diary of an Edwardian Lady, Tutankhamen Jigsaw Puzzle Book, Seven Continents of the World Jigsaw Book - fantastic!

Keen to keep the culture coming, we hit the road for a magical mystery tour, first stop the delightful village of Trumpington to get some petroleum. Then off to Ickworth House, Suffolk. We'd actually learnt from the catastrophic Wren Library closure experience so phoned ahead to discover Ickworth House is next open in March, so quickly modified travel plans toward Anglesey Abbey.

Abbey-house itself closed but had very pleasant walk about the gardens:

This birch trunk is soooo smooooth.

After the stroll about the garden and being scared witless getting swooped by some giant bats (or small-ish birds, definitely one of the two), we headed on to Bury St Edmunds for a looksee about town, visit to the Cathedral and dinner.

Here I'm writing a postcard to Iggy who'd missed the trip as he'd had to stay home to tidy his room (which Ben and I had completely rearranged, i.e. every bit of furniture piled on his bed, the previous night - he won't be leaving his room unlocked ever again), about to hoe into the sumptuous chocolate cheesecake.

Finished cultural-vultural day with late screening of Mulholland Drive at Arts Picturehouse then scampered home to do the seven continents of the world jigsaw.