Form and Colour: Bridget Riley’s ‘Flashback’

Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery currently have an exhibition of Bridget Riley’s work in the Waterhall. Being mostly unfamiliar with Riley’s work (except for the famous ‘Movement in Squares’, right), I thought I’d try to learn more. The exhibition covers Riley’s work from 1961, when she began to experiment with abstract work, and is full of both monochromatic and colourful op art images. In a geometric and tonal way, they are beautiful, though I can’t help but think that some of them are like having a migraine. I can’t look at them for long because of what they do to my eyes – which is in itself an interesting idea: art you can’t stare at. But they are so perfect, so immaculately painted and so exactly right in their use of colour, which is fascinating.

The exhibition includes sketches and developmental works, and it’s really helpful to see how the work has progressed to become a finished item. Yet it’s difficult, especially in the later works, not to be overwhelmed by the colour and size of the pictures; the exhibition notes say that Riley’s work is concerned with ‘movement, light and space’, and the colours and shapes do seem to move and come alive as one looks at them. There’s more information about Riley’s work here, which I found helpful, but I have this feeling I’m missing something important about it! Perhaps that’s because I couldn’t look for long enough.

City of Culture 2013

I’m pleased to see that Birmingham is in the running for City of Culture 2013. I was disappointed when they lost out to Liverpool in 2008, though Liverpool has made the most of it and it’s clearly been a successful venture. Actually, the UK is not due to host another City of Culture until 2032 (because of the expansion of the EU), but the Department for Culture, Media and Sport has decided to “bring the competition closer to home”, as well as to emphasise that “excellence and innovation in the arts does not begin and end inside the M25”. The UK is good at celebrating its culture, generally speaking, and has some amazing arts events to offer, so anything that encourages and supports this seems like a good thing.

The shortlist for City of Culture 2013 includes Barnsley, Carlisle, the whole of Cornwall, Durham, Sheffield and Derry. Obviously I can’t comment on the relative merits of these places (though having the whole of Cornwall up against some quite small cities seems unfair!) But Birmingham, I hope, is well-placed, both geographically and in terms of its commitment to the arts. The Birmingham Repertory Theatre is about to undergo a major facelift along with the building of a spectacular new public library; the Rep puts on a wonderful programme of plays and other events every year, while the library is fantastically well-stocked and has informative and helpful staff. We have other theatres, of course – from the Alexandra, which has a lot of big musicals etc, to the Hippodrome, home of Birmingham Royal Ballet, and the Crescent, which puts on smaller plays, not always professional but always interesting.  There are some brilliant concert venues here in Brum, and, of course, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, with a wonderful collection of Pre-Raphaelite paintings.  If to these amenities was added a further range of public cultural and artistic events, Birmingham would become an even more exciting place to be. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next, and what moves the council makes to ensure our bid is successful.

There is a website with more information about Birmingham’s bid for City of Culture, where you can have your say – have a look at http://www.birminghambigcityculture.com/.

Re-working myths

Yesterday I went into BMAG to have a look at Burne-Jones’ Perseus Series, currently on loan from The Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart. This is the first time the whole cycle of paintings has been on display in the UK, and here it’s shown alongside 3 additional studies for the series, plus some works featuring the Persues myth by other artists. Burne-Jones was commissioned by Arthur Balfour in 1875 to provide a series to decorate his home, but the choice of subject was left to the artist. Burne-Jones was inspired by “The Doom of King Acrisius“, a version of the Perseus myth from Morris’ The Earthly Paradise.

The series depicts the myth in eight large paintings, but they do more than simply tell the tale. Burne-Jones’ interest in the male figure in action and the depiction of the female classical nude is prominent here. With the exception of The Baleful Head, above, in which Perseus shows Andromeda the head of Medusa against a Morris-type verdant background, the paintings focus on the figures set against sparse and unobtrusive landscapes. Looking around the room in which they are displayed, only the luminous flesh of the figures stands out against largely monotone backgrounds.

There is something strikingly modern about Burne-Jones’ figures, despite their obvious referencing of the medieval style and of classical nudes. This is particularly apparent in The Rock of Doom and The Doom Fulfilled, the paintings which show Perseus’ rescue of Andromeda and which bear a resemblance to the Pygmalion series. In the earlier pictures here, it is the composition of figures in the landscape which is paramount, however; how they fill the space and are placed and posed, particularly in Perseus and the Sea Nymphs.

 

The series is not just interesting for its visual qualities, but also for its use and reworking of myth. Though Burne-Jones uses Morris’ version of Perseus, he also draws on other sources, such as the version of Apollodorus, and he brings the figures to life in a way that is often unexpected. Moreover, the exhibition notice comments that: “Burne-Jones believed that Perseus represented the creative impulse in the fight against evil. The hero is the prototype of the artist who gains knowledge and skill to pursue his battle against the forces of materialism symbolised by the Gorgon whose deadly stare turns everything to stone. Andromeda represents beauty and truth saved from destruction.”

The exhibition is on until October and is well worth a look. If you want to read more about the Perseus cycle there is a commentary here on the Victorian Web.

Changing face of fashion

Another small exhibition at BMAG which I found interesting is “Dress and Drawing” in the Print Room, which is on until September 6th. The exhibition looks at depictions of clothes and fashion in a range of images from portraits to fashion plates, and covering artists including Millais, Sargent, Burne-Jones, Laura Knight and Max Beerbohm. There are also two dresses and a range of antique accessories, and some fascinating miniatures, from 1590 to 1820.

Some of the exhibits are cartoons, intended to poke fun at dedicated followers of fashion; some are society portraits, some illustrations from novels. It gives an interesting sense of changing fashion, but moreover highlights how unreliable these images can be for researching fashion, since portraits are frequently of the wealthy upper-classes (for example, Matisse’s Le Renard Blanc, right) rather than the average person, and fashion plates tend to be aspirational rather than indicative of the norm. The nineteenth-century prevails, perhaps unsurprisingly, but it’s an interesting selection.

Ford Madox Brown

I’ve had a busy week – I also went to the opening of Ford Madox Brown: The Unofficial Pre-Raphaelite at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery. I only had time for a quick look around the exhibition, but it looks fascinating and I’m looking forward to returning when I have more time. It’s been a labour of love for Laura MacCulloch, who has been re-assessing the place of FMB in Pre-Raphaelitism through her Ph.D. at the University of Birmingham.
Brown was not one of the founding members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, but as mentor and teacher to them he deserves a place in their history. This exhibition, which focusses on his drawings, looks at Brown in a wider persepctive than is usual. As BMAG’s website says,
“Recent research has revealed the breath of Madox Brown’s achievements as a modernist and a realist in a career spanning some sixty years until his death in 1893.”