Cosmonauts - The Science Museum

Iraklii Toidze, In the Name of Peace, 1959

Cosmonauts: Birth of the Space Age is at the Science Museum until 13 March 2016.
1957 - launch of the first artificial stallite, Спу́тник-1 (Sputnik-1)
1957 - first dog to orbit the Earth: Лайка (Laika)
1961 - the first man in space: Ю́рий Гага́рин (Yuri Gagarin), the first cosmonaut, orbited the Earth in Восток-1 (Vostok-1)
1963 - the first woman in space: Валенти́на Терешко́ва (Valentina  Tereshkova) orbited the Earth in Восток-6 (Vostok-6)
This exhibition brings together many of the artefacts associated with these pioneering days of the Soviet Union's achievements in the Space Race with the United States, including the Vostok-6 capsule flown by Valentina Tereshkova. There is also a splendid display of Soviet posters (see below).

Dr Valentina Tereshkova with Vostok 6 in The Science Museum

Read reviews of the exhibition by Rowan Moore and Lucy Davies,  Read an article about Valentina Tereshkova in which she reveals that the engineers on her mission had forgotten to programme the craft to descend as well as ascend!

Konstantin Ianov, The road is open for humans!, 1960

Boris Staris, The fairy tale became truth, 1961

Boris Berezovsky, Glory to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union!, 1962

Artist unknown, Our triumph in Space is the hymn to the Soviet country!, 1963

Boris Berezovsky, Glory of the Space Heroes - Glory of the Soviet People!, 1963

U. V.Kershin and G.P. Nadezhdin, Glory to the first woman cosmonaut, 1963

Miron Lukianov and Vasily Ostrovsky, Through the Worlds and Centuries,1965

Artist unknown, Soviet Man, Be Proud! You Discovered the Path to the Stars!, n.d.

Lynn Chadwick - Lypiatt Park

In 1958 Lynn Chadwick bought the house and grounds of Lypiatt Park near Stroud in Gloucestershire. According to Wikipedia, Chadwick commented, This place was the same price as a three-bedroom house…and nobody wanted it, so…I borrowed the money and came here. It was sort of wonderful, making another room habitable every year. Later he also acquired more of the surrounding valley in which he placed his work to create a sculpture park. Chadwick died in 2003 but the valley remains as a private sculpture park. A splendid opportunity to visit was offered this weekend through the auspices of the Stroud Civic Society as part of the annual Heritage Open Days scheme.

Click on images to enlarge.

Terry Haggerty - Sikkema Jenkins & Co, NY

Terry Haggerty, Rotational Rest, 2015

Terry Haggerty is at Sikkema Jenkins & Co, New York until 17 October 2015.
Terry Haggerty (BA Fine Art, University of Gloucestershire, 1992) paints rhythmic ribbons of colour on shaped panels of wood and aluminium. The monochrome lines twist and turn through precisely calculated patterns creating a seductive oscillation between flatness and an illusory three dimensionality. The acrylic paint is layered with varnish to create an immaculate finish. Beautiful.
Watch a video interview with Terry Haggerty from 2013.

Terry Haggerty, Relative Density, 2015

Terry Haggerty, Memory Trace, 2015

Terry Haggerty, Easily Lost, 2015

Terry Haggerty, Fuse Link, 2015

Terry Haggerty, Torque, 2015

Terry Haggerty, Hollow Core, 2015

Postcard from Dungeness

The 20ft and 30ft Sound Mirrors at Dungeness

Dungeness, a shingle-beached headland on the coast of Kent, has been on my list of places to visit for years, decades even. So, I was excited to finally get there on a grey and wet August day. (Walking head down in the sometimes driving rain it was difficult to take seriously the designation of Dungeness as the UK's only desert.) The weather did mean that I didn't explore the area as extensively as I would have liked to, but the gloom added to the delicious bleakness of the place.  I did manage to see the key 'sights' - the nuclear power stations, the lighthouses, Derek Jarman's Prospect Cottage and, best of all, the sound mirrors. The sound mirrors were a pre-radar system designed to detect enemy aircraft. Built 1928-30, sound waves were caught by the concave concrete structures and relayed via microphones to an operator. There are 3 mirrors: a 20ft dish, a 30ft dish and a 200ft curved wall. 
A strange and beautiful place.
Watch an extract from the BBC's series Coast in which the mirrors are tested.
Click on images to enlarge.

The old lighthouse and the nuclear power stations

The new lighthouse

The boardwalk to the sea

Shingle, sea, sky

The view to the sea (Click on image to see full panorama)

Power stations and lighthouses (Click on image to see full panorama)

The 30ft Sound Mirror

The 200ft Sound Mirror

All the Sound Mirrors

Prospect Cottage - Derek Jarman's former home

Bridget Riley - De La Warr Pavilion

Bridget Riley, Streak 2, 1979 (Detail - click to see full image)

Bridget Riley: The Curve Paintings, 1961-2014 is at the De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill until 6 September 2015.
The three dimensional illusionism of some of the paintings in this excellent exhibition is palpable. The exhibition as a whole eloquently demonstrates the intelligent precision with which Riley manipulates colour and form to astonishing effects. Yet, although these pauntings are evidently the result of careful calculation they are overwhelmingly sensual objects. As Riley acknowledges, in the interesting catalogue discussion with Paul Moorhouse, she has been profoundly influenced by, notably, Seurat, Cezanne, Matisse and the Futurists. Yet a strength of the paintings is that the viewer need not know anything of the theory and knowledge that has informed them to appreciate their visual effects.
The show includes drawings and cartoons for paintings which reveal Riley's meticulous method. Amongst these is Study for 'Kiss', 1961 which Riley identifies as a breakthrough painting in which the curve as an animating and structural element made its debut in her work. The exhibition's title with the career spanning dates '1961-2014' obscures the fact (but which is made clear in the exhibition itself) that for a period of 17 years (1980-1997) the curve was 'banished' from her work in favour of the linear and diagonal. Thus the exhibition effectively shows 2 bodies of work, the optically dazzling and disturbing paintings made between 1961 and 1980 and the more subtle and calm essays in colour and form made between 1997 and 2014. 
It is a terrific show in a wonderful venue (see end of this blog entry) and a neat  complement to the exquisite Bridget Riley: The Stripe Paintings, 1961-2014 shown at David Zwirner last summer. (See blog entry below).
Read reviews/articles by  Geoff Hands, Maggie Gray,  Mark Hudson, and Jonathan Jones. 
Click on images to enlarge.

Bridget Riley, Study for 'Kiss', 1961

Bridget Riley, Crest, 1964

Bridget Riley, Entice 2, 1974

Bridget Riley, Andante 1, 1980

Bridget Riley, Rêve, 1999

Bridget Riley, Red with Red 1, 2007

Bridget Riley, Rajasthan, 2012 - paint on plaster wall, instalation view

The exhibition venue, the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill is a work of art itself. This remarkable masterpiece of Modernist architecture was designed by Erich Mendelsohn and Serge Chermayeff and opened in 1935. Commissioned through a competition launched by Earl De La Warr, Mayor of Bexhill, 1932-34 and Chairman of the National Labour Party - it was proposed as a socialist pleasure palace by the sea. It is a thrill to visit this unlikely architectural presence in an English seaside resort (indeed, there is precious little such Modernist architecture to be found anywhere in the UK) - and how heartening it is that the building was saved from terminal decline by the enthusiasm of local councillor Jill Theis leading to a refurbishment in 2004-5. 
(No doubt the building is at its best glittering in the sun with  a view across the blue sea to France; on the day I chose to visit the rain poured down, but it was still fabulous.)
Click on images to enlarge.