I had a very good time at the National Gallery the other day. It felt far more reasonable to enjoy the paintings at this museum than at the Tate Modern because it was clear that effort was put into every single one of them. I think that the names of each painting at the National Gallery were lacking severely, I mean, “Portrait of a Boy aged 11” c’mon I could give a million better names–but here are ten
1 Dashing lad
2 What Does He Know?
3 Portrait of my Sleep Paralysis Demon Who Happens to be a Young Boy
4 Evil Baby
5 Eat This Painting
6 If You Can See This Painting Seek Medical Help
7 Paddington as a Human
8 He appeared to me in a Dream
9 This Boy Has no Name
10 Please Put this Painting in The National Gallery
I am really good at naming things. More people should ask me for help.
I think that the painting that stood out to me the most was Saint George and the Dragon by Paolo Uccello because I had learned about it in my Graphic Novels class a few semesters ago when we had a guest speaker come and show us the power of reading images. Humans are able to place emotions and feelings into images and convey complex ideas just through the visual medium. In this painting, we see that the Wyvern has spots on its wings that look like eyes, butterflies have similar patterns on their wings to ward off predators. Based on the wings we can discern that this dragon is to some degree prey. We also see that the Knight is riding in on a white horse and behind him is a dark storm–there is a storm coming– the clouds twist in unnatural patterns and swirl almost like magic making the knight seem all the more powerful. The woman in this painting is remarkably calm given what is transpiring around her. The woman seems to have the wyvern on a leash, insinuating that she is in control or ownership of the beast.
Another piece I felt really spoke to me was the whole Marvel comic they had on display about Saint Francis. As someone who lives and breathes comics, I think that this exhibit was made for me to talk about. So having not read the book and only being able to see the cover and back let me analyze this. You can see that this book was approved by the Comics Code Authority because it has that little stamp in the top right corner, you can also see that the cover art spreads to the back as well which is unusual as the backspace is typically reserved for ads. It can also be deduced that this comic, while published by Marvel, does not take place in the mainline Marvel universe as it has since been confirmed that Jesus Christ is a Mutant in the Marvel Universe and this comic seems a bit more grounded in real-life beliefs. The framing of this cover is very interesting as well as your eyes are instantly drawn to the big head in the middle of the page then you look at the horse and battlefield then your eyes go down the celebration then finally to the pope frame. And that was not even counting the three panels on the back cover which borders all draw your eye to the center of the front cover.
Theatre in London U of A 