Freudian

'What do I ask of a painting? I ask it to astonish, disturb, seduce, convince.'

- Lucian Freud

As Londoners we are spoilt for choices of great art exhibitions, especially this quarter of the year, with David Hockney at the RA and Picasso at the Tate Britain and so on. But for certain, the Lucian Freud Portraits exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery is the one that I will be frequenting for the next few months to come.

With more than 100 early and late works of the great British artist, the exhibition is unmissable. I spent a good few hours wandering, listening to the audio guide, and studying the paintings. The way that Freud so uniquely and eloquently captured human life and flesh, the contour of naked bodies and emotions - it overwhelms you with its disquieting silence, leaving you in awe yet unsettled.

The exhibition closes on 27 May 2012.

Emergence

*from here, Édouard Boubat, Sans titre, 1972

No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.

- Virginia Woolf

For the longest period of time I have been struggling along - amidst broken promises, heartbreaks and inner turmoil, evoked by an irrevocable wreckage of a relationship that I was so dependent on. Looking back at the past few months, I was actually surprised that I have pulled through a rather difficult winter, thanks to the unwavering support from my friends and family (words fail me - how grateful I really am!) and my own little cocktail of happiness, containing -

*poetry, literature: Philip Larkin, George Orwell and Charles Bukowski were my saviours, for their sharp humour and sobering matter-of-fact tone

*fresh cut flowers, and read An Apple a Day for the most delightful arrangement

*tea with friends: make sure you have lots of tea, and meet up with lots of friends

*long walks, getaways: the pebble paths and starry sky of Cambridge, the quietude of the Heath - all sentimenatlity becomes a fleeting modality in the face of nature

*exercise, the biweekly swim in the middle of the day that makes me feel senior

*radio 3: for live jazz and monotonous book-reading to fall asleep with

...

Almost a hundred days later, I realise that the best way to heal is not to efface or evade from emotions, but to rise above them, ride on them as if they were waves - and to hold dearly the belief that, in the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.

x

Bibliophile

*Images by Juliette Tang

Cannot believe I only stumbled upon Juliette Tang's most amazing collection of book photography today! I am in love with her juxtaposition of images and quotes, and how she illuminates the aesthetic front of a shared literary obsession.

You can see her tumblr here and flickr here.

Janvier est...

Waking up with BBC radio 3 Breakfast at dawn when the black birds sing / Free flow of cups of Bettys Darjeeling tea / Reading more books already than 2011 altogether - got into Milan Kundera and Philip Larkin again / Wearing the Russell & Bromley loafers everywhere / Went to the Rothko in Britain exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery / Dined at the beautiful Terroirs (and need to go back again) / Lost the sheet containing my new year resolution already.

x

Cinematic Writing VII

Mantled in grey, the dusk steals slowly in,

Crossing the dead, dull fields with footsteps cold.

The rain drips drearily; night's fingers spin

A web of drifting mist o'er wood and wold,

As quiet as death. The sky is silent too,

Hard as granite and as fixed as fate.

The pale pond stands; ringed round with rushes few

But for the coming of the winter night

Of deep December; blowing o'er the graves

Of faded summers, swift the wind in flight

Ripples its silent face with lapping waves.

The rain falls still: bowing, the woods bemoan;

Dark night creeps in, and leaves the world alone.

- Philip Larkin, Winter Nocturne

Cinematic Writing VI

"Do you still play as beautifully as you used to?"

"I still enjoy it."

"Please play, Elizabeth."

Elizabeth arose immediately. Her readiness to perform when asked had always been one of her amiabilities; she never hung back, apologized. Now as she approached the piano there was the added readiness of relief.

She began with a Bach prelude and fugue. The prelude was as gaily iridescent as a prism in a morning room. The first voice of the fugue, an announcement pure and solitary, was repeated intermingling with a second voice, and again repeated within an elaborated frame, the multiple music, horizontal and serene, flowed with unhurried majesty. The principal melody was woven with two other voices, embellished with countless ingenuities -- now dominant, again submerged, it had the sublimity of a single thing that does not fear surrender to the whole. Toward the end, the density of the material gathered for the last enriched insistence on the dominant first motif and with a chorded final statement the fugue ended. Ferris rested his head on the chair back and closed his eyes. In the following silence a clear, high voice came from the room down the hall.

"Daddy, how could Mama and Mr. Ferris--" A door was closed.

The piano began again -- what was this music? Unplaced, familiar, the limpid melody had lain a long while dormant in his heart. Now it spoke to him of another time, another place -- it was the music Elizabeth used to play. The delicate air summoned a wilderness of memory. Ferris was lost in the riot of past longings, conflicts, ambivalent desires. Strange that the music, catalyst for this tumultuous anarchy, was so serene and clear. The singing melody was broken off by the appearance of the maid.

"Miz Bailey, dinner is out on the table now."

Even after Ferris was seated at the table between his host and hostess, the unfinished music still overcast his mood. He was a little drunk.

- Carson McCullers, excerpt from The Sojourner

Merry

Festive Burlington Arcade // Serpentine Gallery Pavilion a few months back, blooming with late flowers // Riddle & Finns champagne & oyster bar in Brighton // Reading in Rose Bakery with ginger & elderflower honey tea // Somerset House

*

...Christmas and happy new year, dear readers!

I shall be back very soon after the month-long and much needed hiatus.

x