Hooray! A week in London! I can’t believe how quickly the time has passed. Today was a laid back day for me, and at the time of me writing this post I am relaxing in bed with the new season of Stranger Things playing off to the side.
Our group started today with a walk to the Tate Modern museum. On the way there we passed some beautiful sights like the Borough Market, and the Millennium Bridge. We then reached the Tate Modern, which was filled with modern contemporary art. Despite this, my first stop at the museum was the cafe! I hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, so it was a must. I got an egg sandwich and a drink that was a mix of apple and orange juice – both were so good!
Onto the more relevant parts of the Tate Modern. I am personally not the biggest fan of art museums; however, there were some very interesting pieces on display! The first piece that stood out to me was the View from the Window by Marie-Louise Von Molesiczky from 1925. This painting depicted a view of roofs seen from Marie-Louise’s flat from the early 1920s. The paint in this piece was dabbed onto the canvas, which created a mottled effect while also being painted with very free brush strokes. This piece interested me mostly because of its canvas size. I liked how narrow it was, as well as its color palette. Even though the canvas size was on the smaller side, there was a lot you could tell from the areas that were visible. You could tell that it was a stormy, snowy night, and buildings seemed to be piled on top of each other. It really makes me wonder about Marie-Louise’s outlook on her every day life, and if this scene somewhat reflected that.
Another piece I took interest in was Untitled (Cravings White) by Lee Bul from 1988 and reconstructed in 2011. This piece took me by surprise when I first saw it. I turned the corner and boom! I was terrified, because honestly- what IS that? That feeling is what made it appeal to me. I feel as though art is supposed to invoke a powerful emotion from its audience whether that emotion is good or bad. Being terrified of this piece made me want to learn more about it, and seeing the video that was supplied alongside it made me even more intrigued. The video included people wearing the original piece and crawling on the ground in public spaces. I don’t understand this piece fully, even with the video supplement, but I think that is the point of it. I strongly believe that it is meant to confuse the viewer, and it was successful at that!
After viewing a few galleries, I hit up the gift shop at the museum and got some cute earrings! I’m glad I got to take a piece of art back with me, no matter how small it was. I definitely have a newfound appreciation for certain pieces, and hopefully at other art museums I will be able to analyze the different works in a more meaningful way because of this experience.
I then made my way to another museum- the Sherlock Holmes museum! I have wanted to go to this museum since I found out I was going on the study abroad and now I can finally say I’ve done it. The museum was Sherlock’s home at 221B Baker St., and the building was so beautiful! There were great tidbits of information scattered around, and it seemed like virtually everything was placed in each room with purpose. I will say that there were some pretty scary mannequins inside, so I skipped out on those rooms; however, from my quick glance inside, those rooms were just as great! I would love to go back and take more photos, it was all visually stunning.
That was essentially my day! I had some more sushi from Wasabi, and have been in bed watching Stranger Things, just like I mentioned at the start of this blog post. Tomorrow will be a busy busy day, so be prepared… We have the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, and the musical Lift to go to, wish me and my feet luck!
Theatre in London U of A 