The National Gallery

Last night the speaker at our camera club, the famous sports photographer Mark Pain, forgot to come! He was phoned and thankfully he lives in Surrey so he managed to get to us albeit an hour late. It was a pity the talk was shortened, as it was so interesting, and his photos are just brilliant. He discussed a good selection of photos in detail - the key to getting good photos is to be technically competent and prepared, so when the moment arises you can just click the shutter button and know that it will technically be perfect. He has photographed five Olympic Games, and the photos I liked best were the ones when he had captured what he was asked to photograph for the press, and then went off and experimented in getting some different and rather arty shots.

This morning I went to London to attend a guided tour at the National Gallery on 'Women in Art'. It was originally meant to take place in January but had to be postponed due to the train strikes, so it took place today instead. 

Of the 2300 plus pieces of art in the National Gallery there are about 23 works that are done by woman artists, from about six artists, as the art in this gallery is pre 20th century. So today we saw the work of three woman artists  -  Artemisia Gentileschi, Rachel Ruysch and Elizabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun who were all very famous and successful in their time. We also discussed works by famous male artists of popular female subjects like the Virgin Mary and Venus. It was a fascinating morning, and as it was raining it was a good to be inside today. This is a photo of one of the galleries.

Woman were not allowed to paint nude models, so their art was usually of self portraits or still life subjects. Male artists loved to paint the nude female form, and some works were quite disturbing, like Bronzino's painting An Allegory with Venus and Cupid - disturbing as Cupid is the son of Venus and in this painting is seen in an incestuous intimate moment with his mother.

One of the paintings we discussed is (seen in extras) The Rokeby Venus which was slashed with a meat cleaver in 1914 by the suffragette Mary Richardson. It was painstakingly restored but then in November last year it was again attacked by two Just Stop Oil activists. 

It was still raining when I came out at lunch time, so instead of wandering around London taking photos as I planned, I went home. I spent the afternoon choosing and labelling prints for an exhibition at the RAC Club, I need to drop them off tomorrow.