Building the Revolution, Royal Academy of Arts

‘Building the Revolution’ is a small but thoughtful exhibition showing in the upper Sackler Wing at the Royal Academy. I visited after a long look round the Hockney so, I'm afraid, my mind kept wandering back to the bright landscapes on show below.

The show focuses on Soviet Art and Architecture 1915-1935, very much activities that ran in parallel in the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. Pre-revolution the basics of colour and geometry were stripped right back with cool, minimal results. The Russian Revolution in 1917 brought the Bolsheviks to power leading to a period of intense innovation in visual arts and architecture. A radical visual language was established to represent the new world of Soviet Socialism. Artists and architects worked in a burst of creativity, abandoning traditional ways to address the modern world.

This exhibition explores the relationship and interplay between art and architecture, qualities are presented through both forms… the cubist-influenced art is structural and exact and the architecture shows similar qualities, together they present a vivid picture of the idealistic culture of the time.

At times the exhibition is a little too much like a history lesson, though there are some beautiful photos of geometric architecture and lovely artworks by leading Russian avant-garde artists El Lissitzky and Liubov Popova. They save the best till last, the final room shows small cubist works by Russian artist Ivan Kudryashev. The palette used is gorgeous with angular shapes and subtle shading, understated but beautiful work from this little known artist.

David Hockney: A Bigger Picture, Royal Academy

Allow plenty of time when you go to the David Hockney, the hottest exhibition to open in London this month. The Royal Academy dedicates its main space to this illustrious artist, in a major retrospective show that includes over 150 works. Some pieces date back as far as 1956, but most have been created in the last eight years, in a staggering flurry of activity.

With Lucian Freud gone, Hockney is being dubbed as Britain’s best painter - this exhibition seems set to secure the crown. We are taken on a journey through Hockney’s vast output visiting numerous fascinating landscapes from different stages of the artist's life. The exhibition’s sole focus is landscapes… Hockney’s favourite subject receives obsessive and excessive treatment, in particular the lands of East Yorkshire where he has been stationed for the past few years. Many of the huge paintings are made from several adjoined canvases, their sheer scale makes them very impressive and much of the colour is so bright you feel a glow standing beneath them. The colours, the vibrancy, the sense of perspective and line all illustrate the passion behind Hockney’s talent, he often seems overwhelmed by the natural beauty before him, and he certainly presents a glorious picture of our land. ‘Woldgate Woods’ and ‘Winter Timber’ stick in my mind: huge bright canvases, rich and atmospheric, bold and memorable.

The most widely anticipated part of this show perhaps is the suite of iPad drawings, a new technology Hockney seems captivating by. The Arrival of Spring features 51 curious iPad drawings of the same country road at different points of the year. The immediacy and speed with which he can draw on this electronic tablet makes it the perfect medium for capturing ever-changing nature. It is an intriguing marriage: instantaneous modern technology and timeless rustic subject matter. It is a breathtaking room of images: as the drawings are printed on paper their original medium is not immediately obvious; Hockney makes the finger stokes very painterly. They are joyful and lively, full of innocent vision. I would have loved to see the process of creation, an amazing function on the iPad enables one to watch how a picture is drawn.

Towards the end of the exhibition a film is playing, a very different medium for Hockney, but even here his energy and love of colour is evident. The film is a collage of moving images; it is lovely and happy, all the audience were smiling watching dancers in bright costumes with familiar upbeat piano music. I had to drag myself away from staying for a second sitting. David Hockney was born with synaesthesia, a neurological condition where you see colours to musical stimuli. With my interest in music and art this particularly fascinates me, effects that can be noticed in this film, but are perhaps not as obvious in his paintings.

I left feeling overwhelmed and exhausted by this epic exhibition, and yet have no doubt that it was Hockney’s vivid canvases that lifted my mood for the rest of the day, it is the perfect remedy to fight off the January blues.

Exhibition continues until 9 April 2012, book here.

Aware: Art, Fashion, Identity exhibition, and Sketch pop-up cafe at The Royal Academy of Arts

Last Friday I had another successful lunchtime trip, this time to the Royal Academy of Arts specifically GSK Contemporary: AWARE ART FASHION IDENTITY. The GSK Contemporary building is located round the back of the main RA Gallery, and to get there you walk through the very tempting Burlington Arcade, which at the moment feels like it has captured the very essence of Christmas.

The show explores the use of clothing and fashion as an important marker of individuality and social identity, illustrating how fashion can communicate and reveal along with its more obvious practical function. The collection is divided into four sections: Storytelling, Building, Belonging & Confronting and Performance. With work from more than thirty international makers, there is a massive variety to admire. Among the artists there are a few names I recognised: Yoko Ono (see image above), Grayson Perry and Alexander McQueen all contribute.

The work is spaced apart, in fact I feel it gets a bit swallowed up by the very large dark rooms, and so becomes a bit lifeless. There are some amazing feats of patient craft, for example Susie Macmurray’s ‘Widow’ 2009, a magnificent silver dress made from leather and adamantine dressmaker’s pins. The garment is elegant, feminine and seductive and yet painfully repelling, with the connection of female craft and pain. Another mysterious dress hangs wilting in the first corridor. ‘Say Goodbye’, 2010 by Helen Storey is a soluble frock that hangs stagnant melting into a pot of water. I love Grayson Perry’s work and his piece in this show is no exception, his embroidered artist’s robe stands tall, decorated immaculately with big blue eyes.

I found the rest of the work a little lack lustre, although felt oddly calmed by the exhibition. There is an intriguing installation by Hussain Chalayan, ‘Son of Sonzai Suru’, 2010. It uses a traditional form of Japanese puppet theatre to examine the manipulative element of the fashion industry. A female stands in a beautiful lit dress, dark figures surround her, intruding into her space and peering within the dress. It is a haunting display that brings together different cultures and creative disciplines.

Downstairs Mayfair’s renowned restaurant, Sketch returns with its RA Sketch pop-up cafe for a second year and it has never looked better. Pierre Gagnaire has created a menu inspired by Parisian dining available for breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea. I had just eaten a big meal so couldn’t quite manage one of the beautiful looking cakes, but will definitely be returning to try their treats out. I loved the waitresses outfits too, they skip around in ‘labour of love' patterned jackets, fluorescent pink Converse and dinky skirts made by trendy Brick Lane designer, Twin Diverses. Their clothes are less of a uniform more of a fashion statement, very apt considering the exhibition. Despite not feeling quite as exclusive as the Mayfair joint, this pop-up Sketch is a lovely addition to the gallery space.

AWARE: ART FASHION IDENTITY and Sketch pop-up cafe will be open until 30 January 2011.

SARGENT AND THE SEA at The Royal Academy of Arts

John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) was born in Florence and is best known as a portrait painter; sculptor Auguste Rodin called him ‘the Van Dyck of our times’. The current exhibition at The Royal Academy of Arts focuses on Sargent’s marine paintings that are less often displayed.

The show was crowded, and I felt slightly out of place as stuffy women walked past obviously judging my presence. I didn’t take long to look round because it was difficult to get to properly see a lot of the work without getting tutted out of the way. Why do galleries display art in near-darkness? I find it so irritating when I have to squint through dim light to properly see a piece of work.

On a more positive note: some of the seascapes are beautiful. A sense of immediacy is captured within Sargent’s tumultuous waves, sometimes just through a few clever brushstrokes. And despite only being in his twenties when he painted most of the paintings, his visual description of water is skilful and enchanting. I especially noticed the delicate reflections in the puddles on the beaches that make the pictures so romantic. I also enjoyed getting a glimpse of some of Sargent’s sketchbooks- a real insight into how this artist thought through and executed his ideas. Towards the end of the show there are a few watercolour paintings on show. These present a different facet of the artist’s output and show his intimate relationship with the sea.

Overall I was disappointed, the show as a whole is bland, and I left struggling to remember any one picture that particularly impressed me. The exhibition only consists of about six rooms – I personally feel the £8 ticket is too much.

Exhibition continues until 26 September 2010.