Total Art

I’m in London for a couple of days, and I unexpectedly had more free time today than originally planned. Judith Clute suggested that we go and consume some culture, as they would say on Galactic Suburbia. So I allowed myself to be educated, and we went to an art gallery.

To be precise, we went to the Saatchi Gallery on King’s Road, near to Sloane Square tube station. It is an amazing place. The building it occupies is a former military barracks called the Duke of York’s HQ. Presumably it is where the ten thousand men lived when the grand old fellow wasn’t marching them up and down hills. But inside it is thoroughly modern, all glass and steel. And the lighting is fantastic. Clearly a huge amount of effort has gone into thinking about how art can best be displayed. I particularly love the fake skylights that make it look as if the galleries are bathed in natural light.

The exhibition is called Gesamtkunstwerk, which apparently means “total art”, and features a selection of works by many of the most talented of Germany’s young artists. As I generally find with modern art, some of the pieces were amazing, and others left me completely cold. Unusually, the Saatchi Gallery allows photography inside the exhibitions, so I’ve been able to share photos of some of my favorite pieces with you. There’s even one containing a working train set, just for Kevin.

On our way back to Sloane Square Judith and I stopped off at Holy Trinity Church, which is an absolute must visit location for anyone who is a fan of William Morris and similar artists. I have included one photo of that as well.

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Adventures in Gastronomy

On Friday evening, Justina Robson and I were on a panel about politics and science fiction in Stokes Croft as part of the Bristol Festival of Literature. I had got a ticket for Paul Cornell, but he had been lured away elsewhere so I had a ticket going spare. Just as Justina and I were getting ready to leave, Shana Worthen turned up at the hotel. I offered her the ticket, and she said she’d love to come as long as she could still make her dinner reservation. The timings fitted, so off we went.

Along the way we checked out the location of the restaurant where she was eating, and it turned out to be about 5 minutes walk from the venue. Shana asked us if we would like to come along, but warned us that is might be a little pricey. It turned out that she wanted to check out one of the best restaurants in Bristol — indeed, one that was named Best Restaurant in the South West by The Observer’s Food Monthly magazine in 2004 and 2006. I’m not sure what went through Justina’s mind, but my thoughts went like this: 1) I can’t afford it, 2) but it will be much cheaper than a restaurant of equivalent quality in London, 3) and the food will be delicious. So off we went.

Stoke’s Croft is, of course, famously home to an anarchist artist collective. It does not do luxury. And yet here, in what appeared to be a converted shop in an area bright with graffiti, was Bell’s Diner, home to serious gastronomy.

It was indeed expensive, though not the most expensive meal I have ever eaten, or even paid for. As for the food — wow!

Bell’s Diner is not the place to go if you like big portions — they are far more interested in flavor than quantity. But equally they are not snobbish. This is not one of those fine restaurants that one simply must be seen at, darling. Rather it is a place where people who seriously love food can go and eat interesting meals, and discuss them with passionate staff. It is probably not a good bet if you have a lot of allergies, or are very fussy about what you eat. The menu is very restricted. But I suspect that if you gave them enough warning they would try to meet your needs.

We decided that we would each select different dishes off the three-course meal menu, but before we could even get started we got served canapés and a warm, sweetcorn-based drink that I guess was a type of Atole. Given my experience with Peruvian corn-based soft drinks, I was a little dubious, but it was delicious. Apparently it also contained hay, which led Justina and Shana into a long conversation about feeding horses.

I opted for the snails to start, because if I was going to sample unusual cuisine I might as well go for broke. They came in a wonderful parsley sauce. For main course I had halibut and butterbeans, which was pretty much as expected. There are photos of all this below, including what Justina and Shana ordered. We shared tastes, and I found both Justina’s duck and Shana’s partridge to be delicious.

The restaurant makes a point of serving “natural wine”, which is a marketing term for wine that is made with a minimum of chemical treatments. Somehow I talked my companions into ordering a bottle of sauvignon blanc, which was perfect for my food choices. It was also seriously good.

Before dessert our waiter brought us some small drinks to “clear our palettes”. I’m not sure that “clear” was the right term as they fairly exploded with flavor. At the bottom of the glass was a sloe-gin flavored layer with the consistency (but not sugar) of jam. Above that was a syllabub-like layer flavored with elderflower, and the top was sprinkled with “lime powder”. The lime rather overpowered the delicate elderflower taste, but the drinks were very good.

For dessert both Justina and Shana went for chocolate-based dishes. I opted for the gingerbread soufflé, filled with a bay leaf and ginger yoghurt. Yes, I did say “bay leaf”. I shared out tastes, took a mouthful myself, and died of pleasure. That was the best dessert I have ever eaten. Justina and Shana loved it as well.

Coffee came with delicious petits fours, but we were stuffed and had to ask to take them home.

Photos of all of the dishes are available below. This blog accepts no responsibility for any hunger that you may suffer from viewing them.

Yes, it was expensive. And yes, I am going back as soon as I can afford to.

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Gorillas!

Some of you may remember that last year I blogged about lion statues in Bath. Well, not to be outdone, Bristol has animal statues this year. They are gorillas, and they are there to celebrate the 175th anniversary of Bristol Zoo. You can learn more about them here.

The gorillas have been hanging around various locations in the city for a couple of months, and have just been rounded up by their keepers for a little restoration work before they all go on display together at the zoo for the week Sept 24-28. On the 29th the statues will be auctioned off to benefit gorilla conservation and the local charity, Wallace and Gromit’s Grand Appeal.

I only managed to snap a fraction of the entire group — there were 61 in total, and one had wandered off as far as Birmingham — but here are my photos of the ones I did see.

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Urban Beauty – Bristol Style

All big cities have their areas of urban blight. Bristol is no exception. It is, however, the home of Banksy, and as a consequence the city council has a much more enlightened view of graffiti than is taken by most such bodies. Last week that view produced some glorious results.

Those of you whom I have shown around Bristol (Kevin, Glenda, Farah & Edward from memory) will doubtless remember walking down Broad Street to the ancient Church of St. John the Baptist where two mediaeval archways have been decorated with murals to discourage graffiti. Beyond that is Nelson Street, an archetypal concrete monstrosity, but now home to See No Evil, a magnificent exhibition of street-painting art.

You can learn more about the exhibition, and the artists involved, at the official website. My own photos are available below, and I’m sure that Google will turn up many more. There were certainly plenty of people taking pictures there yesterday when I took mine. Hopefully the art will be there for a long time to come. The site is about half an hour’s walk from the BristolCon venue.

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Pictures of a Drowning Girl

On Kyle Cassidy’s LiveJournal today there was news about a new book he’s putting together. The idea is to do a collection of stills from a (fictional) movie of Caitlín R. Kiernan’s forthcoming novel, The Drowning Girl, a Memoir. The project is being funded on Kickstarter, and ordinarily I’d send you over there to donate. But this is Kyle, so of course it is funded already. In less than a day.

What I’m hoping is that all this enthusiasm for Kyle, who is magnificently talented at what he does, will rub off on Caitlín. I thought that her previous book, The Red Tree, was magnificent. (And so did the World Fantasy jury.) Amazon says the new book is due out in March. I’ll be getting a copy.

Loadsa Photos

One of the jobs I have been working through this weekend is processing the photos that Kevin took while he was over here at Eastercon. My apologies for him for having taken so long. Hopefully his mom, sister and nephew can get to see them now.

We have a selection of photo albums taken in London:

And couple taken at the convention:

The Admiralty Ball ones, of course, include pictures of us in costume.

Finally I have posted my own photos from Alt.Fiction. These are actually taken in and around Derby, in particular the magnificent exhibition of Rolls Royce engines in the Old Silk Mill.

Holiday Gifts 2: Aussie Photos

It being very cold here, I have been spending some time reviewing pictures of the vacation that Kevin and I took in Northern Queensland after Worldcon. As many of you are also in the middle of winter, I thought I would share some photos.

To start with, here’s a look at Cairns itself.

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Next up, our rail trip up to Kuranda, complete with fruit bats and butterflies.

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And finally, the Great Barrier Reef. Kevin got some really great underwater photos.

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Pictures of N’Awlins

As most of you probably know by now, this past week Neil Gaiman invited a bunch of friends to New Orleans to help celebrate his 50th birthday. He was kind enough to invite me, but of course I can’t travel to the US so I have had to follow events online. It sounds like everyone had a wonderful time, and importantly Kyle Cassidy was there to record the goings on. There may well be a book of photos at some point, but in the meantime Kyle was kind enough to share this wonderful picture of Gary K. Wolfe.

Gary K. Wolfe - (c) Kyle Cassidy 2010

When I first heard about this event I had a sneaking suspicion that something else might happen. Weddings, as most of you who have gone through them will know, can be fraught affairs filled with much family in-fighting. The chance to get married in the company of a large group of dear friends is something that can be denied many of us. So I was pleased to see that Amanda sprang a little surprise.

Neil, Amanda and Jason - (c) Kyle Cassidy 2010

The young man giving Amanda away is Jason Webley.

Neil was quick to point out that they still need to have a legal ceremony, but this looks like it was quite wonderful.

Happy birthday Neil, and my very best wishes to you and Amanda.

Playing Tourist

Friday was spent looking around Carins, and flying down to Sydney. Saturday was spent walking around Sydney. Kevin and I have been very touristy. Here are a few highlights.

The Golden Century in Sydney is still my favorite Chinese restaurant in the world, both for quality and value for money.

Sydney Aquarium is now even more awesome than last time I went. I could spend all day in there. Of course it helps that I like fish, but unless you have a phobia you really should experience their Shark Tunnel. I should note that the Nurse Sharks they have in the tank are relatively wussy as sharks go, and are unlikely to try to eat you should you encounter one in the wild, but boy do they look bad.

We spent a lot of time around Sydney taking photographs. In particular Kevin took a lot of pictures of the monorail when we rode it. No one rushed up to us to try to stop us doing it and take our cameras away. There was no suggestion that we were somehow helping international terrorism by our shutterbug activities. It was like living in a free country again. Such a welcome change from the UK and USA.

Talking of photos, Kevin has left me with a large pile of them. Also some video. I will process them as and when I can. But I will also have a lot of work to catch up on when I get home.

The Pride of Bath

Those of you following my Twitter feed will know that I have been photographing lions during my recent trips to the city. This is one of those animal art installations that have become so popular in recent years. Eventually 100 different lions will appear all over the city (and nearby locations). Thus far I have only found 16 of them. If you want to learn more about the lions and their creators, check out the official web site. In particular check out the news page for some of the celebrities who have got involved and a couple of great stills of one of the lions meeting its relatives at Longleat house.

Here are the photos I have taken thus far, plus one of a little friend who asked to come home with me.

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Stop, Don’t Shoot!

I wonder idly whether it is the use of the word “shoot” to mean both fire a weapon and take a picture with a camera that has police forces, security guards and petty bureaucrats all over the world in such a panic about cameras.

Anyway, if you happen to be in London tomorrow, there is a demonstration you might like to join. It is organized by photographers to protest against the increasing use of anti-terrorism legislation to hassle photographers (generally innocent tourists, artists and journalists) in the city. The Guardian has further details, or you can check out the Facebook page.

Go if you can. Take your camera.