Despite being separated in time by nearly 200 years, Sigmar Polke felt a deep admiration for Francisco de Goya. The show at Museo del Prado, Sigmar Polke. Affinities Revealed, explores how the Spanish master influenced the work of the German painter, after he saw for the first time Goya’s Time and the Old Women in 1982.
From painting to photography, film installations and prints, Polke’s work revolutionised the international art scene. His use of innovative materials and techniques combined with his often-confrontational attitude towards political and social conventions labelled him as an anti-establishment artist.
Francisco de Goya, in his own way, was also an anti-establishment artist. He lived during the turbulent times of the Napoleonic invasion, a time when the Spanish monarchs were useless and the Church abused its power to criminal levels. His disgust was reflected in his art, which he used as a weapon to denounce the horrors and injustices he witnessed. At the same time, he could be humorous and acerbic, very much like Sigmar Polke.
Sigmar Polke taking a photograph of the painting Time and the Old Women, by Goya,…
It has been six years since we last had the chance to admire Murakami’s work in London. Japanese Art History à la Takashi Murakami presents an exceptional opportunity to explore the artist’s interpretation of Japanese historical paintings. Murakami’s work plays with blending commercial imagery, manga and of traditional art. In fact, he himself has several […]
This extended festive season, make it your mission to visit the Old Royal Naval College to see Luke Jerram’s astronomical installation, Mars. The latest planet on display follows on from the success of the artist’s other works Gaia and Museum of the Moon and will complete the trilogy of installations at Greenwich. Mars, our nearest […]
The scientific endeavours of the French monarchy in the 17th and 18th centuries
A thirst for scientific knowledge is probably not the first thing that comes to anyone’s mind when they think of Versailles, but the exhibition Versailles: Science and Splendour at the Science Museum in London proves how interested the French monarchy of the 17th and 18th centuries was in this topic.
The French kings realised that technology and scientific leadership were allies of power and prestige. From Louis XIV’s creation of the Academy of Sciences in 1666 to Louis XVI’s ordering of La Pérouse’s expedition to the Pacific in 1785, Versailles: Science and Splendour explores the scientific spirit of these monarchs and their courts.
Particular attention is given to the role of women in science, such as the pioneering midwife Madame du Coudray and Emilie du Châtelet, the eminent physicist and mathematician who translated Isaac Newton’s Principia.
The exhibition at the Science Museum is divided into three main topics. The first, Harnessing Science, focuses on the exploration of time and space. It is here that visitors can also discover the monumental gardens of Versailles in a new light. Louis XIV built spectacular fountains and water features, which required significant hydraulic engineering and mathematic expertise.
The second is Understanding Nature. Often spurred by the luxurious and demanding taste of the kings, botanists and engineers would work together to grow exotic fruits and zoologists would look after probably the most pampered menagerie in the world, which at the time of Louis XV included a rhinoceros.
More importantly, though, the support of these kings was crucial to the development of medical advances. For example, Louis XVI got himself and his whole family vaccinated against smallpox and Louis XV supported the training of midwives across France to reduce infant mortality and grow a populous and strong kingdom.
The final topic, Embracing Knowledge, shows how royal families were educated in physics, mathematics and chemistry. Their example was followed by the aristocracy and even the bourgeoisie, always aspiring to rub shoulders with their “betters”.
Versailles: Science and Splendour also reflects the court’s taste for spectacle. The palace provided an influential platform for scientific figures to present their work, as well as for the kings to display their power through extraordinary demonstrations, such as the flight of Etienne Montgolfier’s hot-air balloon at Versailles in 1783.
Versailles: Science and Splendour The Science Museum, Exhibition Road, London SW7 2DD 12th December 2024 – 21st April 2025 Further information and tickets, HERE.
The past 50 years have seen the incorporation of new disciplines, new technologies and new platforms of expression by artists from all fields. The Living End exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago focuses on painting, examining the questions presented by these innovations, countering the recycled discourse that “painting is dead”.
Cutting across geographies, histories and contexts, The Living End explores the different methods artists have used to challenge or intervene in the practice of painting and the role of painters over the past 50 years. The suggestion is that painting is a living art, in a constant state of renewal and rebirth.
From the experiments with computer-assisted graphics in the mid-1960s to the prevalence of screens and artists mining online digital and social media culture today, the show considers the impact of various representational technologies and production methods, such as the use of video and still cameras; computers, the internet and screens; automation; and the performing body. Comprising paintings, performances, videos and installations, The Living End explores the ways artists working across media have challenged the mythologies of painting, ultimately changing our understanding of what art constitutes.
The curators – Jamillah James and Jack Schneider – have emphasised the critical reading of the painting, its tropes, its prominence in the Western canon, and its historical associations with privilege. As technology increases access to the means of production, the model of the painter as a singular “genius” is being decentralised, opening abstract and representational painting to new perspectives.
Particularly interesting is the study of the cyclical relationship between still photography and painting, as well as how video has allowed artists working in performance the possibility of critiquing the trajectory and status of painting. Lastly, The Living End exhibition looks at the automation of painting, where the artist’s hand is largely absent, complicating the role of the artist as producer and the market’s enduring interest in painting as a commodity.
Author: Lavinia Dickson-Robinson
The Living End: Painting and Other Technologies, 1970–2020 Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, 220 E Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60611 9th November 2024 – 23th March 2025 More information and ticketsHERE.
Opening image: Tala Madani, Solitaire (still), 2023.Single-channel color animation; 5 minutes, 58 seconds. Courtesy the artist; 303 Gallery, New York; and Pilar Corrias, London.
Nurturing creativity through art, education and nature
The Duke of Richmond and Gordon has announced a new creative endeavour to the rich palette of the Goodwood Estate: The Goodwood Art Foundation, which will open in May 2025.
Covering 11,000 acres of ravishing West Sussex countryside, the Goodwood Estate is already world-famous for hosting some of the biggest and most prestigious events in the British social calendar: Festival of Speed, Qatar Goodwood Festival, Goodwood Revival and Goodwoof.
The Foundation will exhibit works by internationally renowned artists. The canvas will be the gorgeous natural landscape of the Goodwood Estate.
The not-for-profit Goodwood Art Foundation will concentrate on the three pillars of Art, Environment, and Education. It will curate exceptional experiences and nurture creativity and life-long learning for people of all ages through a deep connection with art, education, and nature.
Left: Canaletto, Whitehall and the Privy Garden from Richmond House, Goodwood Estate. Right: Stubbs, Racehorses Exercising, Goodwood Estate.
The Duke of Richmond and Gordon say the initiative ties in with Goodwood’s centuries-long relationship with art. “Over the last three hundred years, the Dukes of Richmond at Goodwood have collected masterpieces by Canaletto, Reynolds, Romney, Stubbs and Van Dyck. The creation of the Goodwood Art Foundation signals the next chapter in this long and pioneering history of engagement with art.”
The Foundation will present a headline exhibition by an illustrious artist every season. It will open with a show focused on Dame Rachel Whiteread, one of the most highly regarded sculptors of her time and the first female artist to win the Turner Prize.
“I am thrilled to be launching this great new venture, which will form a vital part of Goodwood’s 21st century legacy.”
– The Duke of Richmond and Gordon
The exhibition will feature not only her compelling sculptures, set against the backdrop of the splendid Goodwood countryside but also her photography, a rarely seen but very impressive string to her bow, in the restored Pavilion Gallery.
Whiteread says, “I am delighted to be the first artist profiled in the inaugural exhibition within the beautifully refurbished Pavilion Gallery and landscape of the new Goodwood Art Foundation.
“The ethos of providing audiences with the opportunity to experience contemporary art integrated into a carefully designed natural environment is something I particularly respond to. It has been an honour to work with the curatorial and exhibition team from the outset, alongside the journey of discovery within the landscape.”
Left: Rachel Whiteread, Detached 2, 2012 (Photo by Mike Bruce). Right: Portrait of Dame Rachel Whiteread (Photo courtesy of the artist and Gagosian).
That’s not all. A major landscape development programme at the Foundation, generously backed by the Stephen A. Schwarzman Foundation, is also scheduled. It is being overseen by the award-winning horticulturalist and landscape architect Dan Pearson.
The entire project is an enormously exciting and inspirational artistic enterprise.
How would we sum up the prospect of the Goodwood Art Foundation, then? Glorious.
Author: James Rampton
Opening image: Goodwood House. Photo by James Fennell. Photo of The Duke of Richmond and Gordon by Uli Weber.
Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael: Florence, c. 1504 explores the rivalry between the Renaissance titans Michelangelo and Leonardo and their influence on the young Raphael. In 1504, the three masters briefly coincided in Florence, seeking the attention of the city’s most influential patrons.
In this must-see exhibition, the Royal Academy presents more than 40 works, including Michelangelo’s Taddei Tondo, Leonardo’s Burlington House Cartoon, with new research regarding the original context of the drawing, and Raphael’s Bridgewater Madonna, which was heavily influenced by Taddei Tondo, together with some of the finest drawings from the Italian Renaissance.
Left: Leonardo da Vinci, The Virgin and Child with St Anne and the Infant St John the Baptist (“The Burlington House Cartoon”) c.1506-08 (*). Right: Raphael, The Virgin and Child with the Infant St John the Baptist(“The Esterhazy Madonna”), c. 1508 (**).
The exhibition culminates in the encounter between Leonardo and Michelangelo. In 1503, the Government of Florence had commissioned Leonardo to paint a monumental mural, the Battle of Anghiari, in its newly constructed council hall. At the end of the summer of 1504, around the time Michelangelo’s David was installed on the ringhiera in front of the Palazzo Vecchio, that artist was asked to paint the accompanying Battle of Cascina. Neither project was ever completed, but the exhibition brings together Leonardo and Michelangelo’s much-admired preparatory drawings from various collections across Europe, providing a fascinating insight into the approach of both artists as they developed their compositions. Visitors can also examine a drawing by Raphael, c. 1505-06 (Ashmolean Museum, Oxford), in which he painstakingly copies the central scene of Leonardo’s Battle of Anghiari.
Royal Academy of Arts, London W1J 0BD The Gabrielle Jungels-Winkler Galleries | Burlington Gardens 9th November 2024 – 16th February 2025 For more information and tickets, HERE.
Other must-see exhibitions currently on show in London: Mapping the Tube, and Wes Lang: The Black Paintings among others. Visit our Culture section for more curated recommendations and reviews, and to stay updated on the art world’s elite events.
Author: Lavinia Dickson-Robinson
Opening image: Bastiano da Sangallo, after Michelangelo Buonarroti, The Battle of Cascina (“The Bathers”), c. 1542. Oil on panel. Holkham Hall, Norfolk, Collection of the Earl of Leicester. By kind permission of the Earl of Leicester and the Trustees of Holkham Estate.
(*) Charcoal with white chalk on paper, mounted on canvas, 141.5 x 104.6 cm. The National Gallery, London. Purchased with a special grant and contributions from the Art Fund, The Pilgrim Trust, and through a public appeal organised by the Art Fund, 1962.
(**) Tempera and oil on panel, 28.5 x 21.5 cm. Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest.
It has been a long journey for Wes Lang to this nirvana-esque state as an artist. As I sit with him in a quiet corner of a hotel bar, he reflects on how he arrived at this time and place in his life. Explaining how his latest works, The Black Paintings, came to be, he credits the Taoist approach that has been his guiding principle, “I just show up and the things that need to happen just happen. I don’t try anymore; I’m just the vessel to let this stuff [the artworks] exist because it needs to exist. That’s very much the Taoist type philosophy: the universe will move through you.”
Alienation in his school years and the gift of Ram Dass’s book, Be Here Now, saw the young Lang take to the Taoist philosophy as a means to understand life and control the anxiety he felt. Looking back, he now realises that “I would lose my way with Taoism at times, and then come back and understand it. If I hadn’t been diligently practising what I need to practise, I would then implement it back into my life, and instantly feel better.”
I have known Wes Lang for the past few years. We have spent many an hour at his home or in his studio in Los Angeles “chewing the fat” about life, art and everything in between. For him, it is all on one continuum. There is no separation between who he is, what captures his attention and the artistic representation of it all. His work is a commentary on the world we live in, the daily routines through which we navigate ourselves and what the outcome of that may be.
Wes Lang in his studio in Los Angeles.
The Black Paintings are currently being exhibited at Damien Hirst’s Newport Street Gallery in London. Lang caught Hirst’s attention when the American artist transitioned from working in New York to his current studio in Los Angeles at the end of 2012, after realising he needed a change of scene for his work to progress. Over several years and for different lengths of time, he would stay at the legendary Chateau Marmont, where he turned his sojourns into an artistic residency with a series of drawings that formed the basis of an exhibition at the hotel at the end of his stay.
The City of Angels provided new sources of inspiration and, once he found the right studio, Lang’s art progressed to working on larger canvases, with a different colour palette and aesthetic. Along with Kanye West asking him to do the imagery for the Yeezus tour, the move west propelled his renown onto the global scene.
“I wanted to capture an alternative view to the divisiveness in the world right now and show people that what we are being fed is fostering a world that is becoming more divided.”
– Wes Lang
A predominant theme in Lang’s art is visual iconography. To Native Americans, totems are a graphical reference to a spirit being, sacred object or symbol of an individual or tribe. For Lang, totems are childhood reference materials that he hoarded as a kid, as he explains. “I just collected visual information in a way that I never saw anybody else doing. Not to pin on my walls though, I kept it very private, and then I would just sit and copy it.”
For Lang, the American West and Native American culture were symbols of freedom. “I had a lot of issues at school with other kids,” he comments, “and I was chastised for it and picked on for being different. We rented a little house in the Hamptons and there was a Native American reservation there. Getting away from my town and going to this place, putting on war paint, making headdresses and riding around, I felt free to be me.”
There had long been an association between the Native American people and the expression of a harmonious society in Lang’s mindset. One of the perennial characters in his large canvases are skeletal-faced braves and chiefs – the latter often in full headdress, where the totems symbolise familiar legends or lineages. Dee Brown’s book Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee recounts how the American expansion westwards impacted the Indigenous society. While the artist sees the world as potentially at a tipping point now, with “false news and made-up facts”, he admits that to some extent he is removed from it, following the Tao and living the life of a quasi-hermit in his home and studio.
This isolation, he reckons, has seen everything come together, with a progression in his abilities as an artist. “For the last five years what I have seen and been striving to do with my art has been a breakthrough that feels amazing. I’m just so fucking excited to pick up paintbrushes, and my mind is just overflowing with ideas.”
Created between 2022 and 2024,The Black Paintings are the result of this journey, a time of a sustained “laser-focused” work stream that narrates a certain dismay with the world and the direction in which all of us are being corralled. “I wanted to capture an alternative view to the divisiveness in the world right now and show people that what we are being fed is fostering a world that is becoming more divided. I found that I don’t want to live that way.” So, the solution through his art is to “show that we are actually born as vessels of love, and we are all one gigantic soul in which we are all interconnected”.
The narrative for the paintings revolves around “heroes forced into scenarios where evil keeps popping up in different forms. It’s where we are in society today as we cannot escape the different faces of evil that harass us every day. It’s the perpetuation of the propaganda of people needing to take drugs to feel better.” Echoing his experience from his school days, he adds, “We are told there’s something wrong with everybody and we’re supposed to accept it. I did this work to show that these characters, when faced with evil, instead of being split apart by it, they became stronger and closer, and defeated it. It might be very basic and simple, but most things are pretty basic and simple when you break them down.”
There is now a sense of peace and equilibrium in Lang’s life. A monograph of his works to date entitled Everything was published in 2022. He is now a husband and father, creating work and simply “being”. Every day starts with the same routine, consulting the Tao, which the artist describes as “always saying exactly what I’m thinking about when I wake up, or what I need to know to get through the day. As you finish a cycle, you start again. One verse each morning, and I just think on it, and it sets me up for the day.” Unknowingly, one day his morning read of the Tao determined the completion of The Black Paintings. “As I read the last line in that morning’s verse, I realised I was going to finish this body of work.”
More about The Black Paintings exhibition at Newport Gallery in London, HERE.
The exhibition Mapping the Tube: 1863-2023 at The Map House in London shows the evolution of one of Britain’s top 10 design icons: the London Tube map. Today it is the template for other subterranean railway systems worldwide and is famous as an archetypal example of information abstraction where what the traveller needs to know is reduced to the bare essentials.
Although there were earlier attempts to simplify the map for the burgeoning London Underground system, most notably by MacDonald Gill and Fred Stingemore (Beck’s predecessor), it was Beck who realised that for passengers, the physical location of the stations in terms of the surface geography was inconsequential; they only needed to know which lines to travel on, and where, if necessary, they needed to change.
In 1931, Beck created the first diagrammatic London Underground map while being laid off from the Signalling Department for the Underground Electric Railways of London. While drawing an electrical circuit diagram he realised a map could be drawn that was based upon the same schematic in which all the stations were more-or-less equally spaced using straight lines of different colours, with 45-degree angles. Although Beck’s design was initially rejected, the Publicity Office of London Transport eventually changed its mind, and the map was first issued as a pocket edition in January 1933. Immediately popular, the Underground has used many variations to illustrate the network ever since.
Left, Harry Beck with his London Underground schematic from 1963, shortly before he would give up on his lawsuit concerning the proprietary rights over the Tube map. Right, annotated unpublished proof of Harry Beck’s 1933 first edition Tube Map, Harry Beck, 1932. Courtesy of The Map House.
Beck had a fractured relationship with the London Underground throughout his career. He was reportedly paid just five guineas for the map (around £20 in today’s money) and 10 guineas for the card edition. Understandably, he tried to regain control threatening legal action, but 1965 he abandoned the attempt. Posthumously, in 1997, his importance was recognised, with a citation statement now printed on every London Underground map.
Marlboro Road (Marlborough) Tube station in 1933 (left) and today (right). Closed in 1939-40 when a new stretch of the Bakerloo opened, it now operates as a nondescript power substation to support Metropolitan line trains.
What makes the exhibition so captivating, especially for Londoners, is the range and extent of variations in the Tube map over the decades since its initiation. There are lost names and forgotten stations, such as Mark Lane or Marlboro Road. The exhibition includes some of the most significant Beck manuscripts, where some were the result of gifts to his friend and biographer Ken Garland, and the first time they have been seen outside of private collections.
Left, the Wonderground Map of London, Macdonald Gill, 1914. Courtesy of The Map House. Right, The Londoner’s Transport Throughout the Ages, R.T. Cooper, 1928. Courtesy of The Map House.
The highlight is arguably a one-of-a-kind draft copy of Harry Beck’s first Underground map, annotated by Beck and Stingemore, which highlights some of the tricky design questions he had to overcome, such as whether to use the official name of Willesden Junction (New Station) or stick with a simplified Willesden Junction. There is also an exceedingly rare 1st Edition Underground poster map (1933), of which only five copies – of the original 2,000 – are known to still exist, along with a unique, unfinished sketch from 1950, drawn in coloured pencil, showing a proposed new layout for the District Line to Richmond, where the station Walham Green has been changed to its current name: Fulham Broadway.
Unfinished sketch showing a proposed new layout for the District Line branch to Richmond, Harry Beck, 1950. Courtesy of The Map House (cropped from the original).
The exhibition is a fascinating insight into the evolution of London through a single stylised map of its underground rail network, and the triumph of distinctive and innovative cartographic design.
Mapping the Tube: 1863-2023
The Map House, 54 Beauchamp Place, Knightsbridge, London, SW3 1NY.
Monday – Friday, 10:30 am – 6 pm; Saturday, 10.30 am – 5 pm. Until 30th November 2024.
Author: Andrew Hildreth
Leading image: Cropped lower section of Beck’s First Edition Double-Crown Tube Map, Harry Beck, August 1933. Courtesy of The Map House.
Tanween 2024, Saudi Arabia’s most important design conference, comes back to Ithra this month. Running between 31st October and 6th November 2024, Tanween celebrates the very best in global design and innovation.
Shahad Alwazani, programme lead for the conference, explains why Tanween is such a significant event in the world of design. “Its success is largely due to its diverse and impactful programme that prioritises cross-cultural dialogue and concrete opportunities to innovate.
“Over the years, Tanween has welcomed more than 150,000 participants of all backgrounds, from design experts, and established and promising creatives of the region to design students, but also local audiences including families, schools and design enthusiasts.
“We pride ourselves in offering an event that not only attracts the global design community but also inspires new audiences to join this open dialogue connecting creativity and innovation.”
Routes to Roots, an exhibition co-curated by Ithra and Isola, was inaugurated at Tanween 2023. Photo courtesy of Ithra Studio.
Manar Aldhwila, Head of Creativity and Innovation at Ithra, also emphasises the huge breadth of areas covered at the conference, “Tanween offers a diverse programme ranging from architecture to fashion, design, innovation and entrepreneurship that nurtures idea-sharing and allows for tangible creative collaborations to flourish. I think this is the key to the continued success of Tanween.”
Aldhwila also explains how, throughout the last six editions, Tanween has become a catalyst for innovative and sustainable design solutions, fostering cultural connections and enriching communities worldwide.
The theme for Tanween 2024 is “Fail Forward.” It focuses on the astonishing opportunities for progress and innovation that can often emerge from creative setbacks. Alwazani outlines the inspiration behind the theme. “With Tanween this year, we wanted to explore and celebrate the opportunities for growth that challenges and obstacles bring about. Some months ago, a dear and wise friend said, ‘Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn, but you never fail’, and I took that as inspiration for the theme ‘Fail Forward.’
“Failure, or challenges, don’t hold you back; they can propel you forward and enable new and improved creations to flourish. So we are hoping that this year’s conference can lead participants to relish the entire design process, and not just the end product.”
“Tanween is more than a moment set in time and space. It triggers conversations and collaborations that resonate far beyond the conference.” – Shahad Alwazani
Highlights this year include such distinguished global contributors as internationally acclaimed designer Ross Lovegrove and Lebanese artist Rana Salam. The programme also features “A Day with an Expert” masterclasses which invite a group of people with similar passions to spend a day with a top expert in their field. This year’s group experts are world-renowned tech designer Sebastian Errazuriz and Forbes Award-winning entrepreneur Farah Al Humaidhi.
What do the organisers hope that participants will take away from this very influential conference, then? Alwazani comments: “Tanween is more than a moment set in time and space. It triggers conversations and collaborations that resonate far beyond the conference. Our international exhibition, Routes to Roots, developed with Italian design platform Isola and inaugurated at last year’s Tanween, has travelled to Milan Design Week and will also be showcased at the upcoming Dutch Design Week.
“With these initiatives instigated during Tanween but now travelling around the world, we can promote Arab heritage to new audiences and spotlight the next generation of regional designers internationally.”
Tanween 2023 workshop. Photo courtesy of Ithra Studio.
Aldhwila adds,”Tanween 2024 promises to stimulate creativity and empower talented designers to experiment with their creative setbacks to reach new breakthroughs and advance global design practices. All of this brings together our overarching aim of conceptualising solutions to the challenges we see around us.
“We are excited to see as many of you as possible at Tanween 2024 and hope that attendees leave inspired, refreshed and invigorated to face challenges head-on!”
Surely that’s an offer you can’t refuse.
Tanween 2024 31st October -6th November 2024 Ithra Theater, King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture Saudi Arabia Find more information about Tanween 2024, HERE. More articles about Saudi Arabia: Design Space Alula, Diriyah City of Earth, Diriyah at Harrods.
Author: James Rampton
Opening image: Iwan Pavilion, winning project of the Tanween 2023 Pavilion Challenge, Courtesy of Ithra Studio.
If Jewels Could Talk is an original history of humanity through jewellery. Carol Woolton writes with authority and passion, both of which make this book an easy and interesting read, taking us from cave times to the present through the objects we have used for self-adornment.
Woolton has chosen seven items: hoops, rings, beads, charms, brooches, cuffs and head ornaments. In each chapter she reveals fascinating stories that reflect the various meanings of jewellery. From protective amulets to tribal identity, religious beliefs or self-ratification, jewellery has always been a way to identify and communicate.
In If Jewels Could Talk, Woolton explains not just the origins of jewellery and their presence in different civilisations, but she also explores their profound meaning for humans.
Looking back over the history of jewellery, I can only conclude that it fulfils a primal urge to decorate themselves.
– Carol Woolton
She credits gold hoops with being the world’s first fashion accessory, with the earliest having been found in Nubia, dating from around 2500BC, probably worn as symbols of power and social status. The circle shape is intimately connected to humans since the invention of the wheel in the Bronze Age. Every civilisation has a strong link to circles, from Greeks, Romans and Egyptians to the Arabs, Celts and Vikings. In our time, most designers have come out with different forms of hoop jewellery, among them Dolce & Gabbana, whose Sicilian Cart Loops in gold with rubellite, amethyst, tourmaline, emerald and multicoloured sapphires paid homage to the colourful carretto siciliano, introduced by the Greek during the 8th century BC.
Dolce & Gabbana Sicilian Cart hoops, from their Alta Gioielleria Collection 2018, haute couture translated to jewels.
In the chapter dedicated to rings, Woolton emphasises their meaning as bonds with other people, may that be a partner (wedding ring), a family (signet ring) or to discreetly indicate the position within a society – as in ancient Egypt and Rome. But rings have also been used in history for sinister purposes, as is the case with “poison rings” which reached their peak of popularity in the Renaissance, often used by wealthy families to eliminate obstacles in their quest for power.
Another captivating story is that of beads, which seem to have evolved alongside humans, having been used as protection, currency, art and even for praying, as in the Catholic rosary, the Hindu and Budhist japamala and the Muslim tasbih. Heavily coloured by superstition, the history of charms is that of human fear of the unknown, and as such, they have been used from the beginning by our species as ways to ward off evil and attract good luck. Coco Chanel was very superstitious, so always wore a bracelet with items she believed would protect her and bring her good fortune. There were old coins, Maltesse crosses, camellia flowers, interlocking ‘C’s and her lucky number, five.
Left, a Victorian “Essex crystal” bumble bee brooch, circa 1880 (Hancocks), set in rock crystal and yellow gold. Right, engagement ring from De Beers Classic collection set in rose gold with a round brilliant diamond and fancy pink diamonds.
Brooches may have started to be used for practical reasons, just to hold two pieces of fabric together, but soon became an adornment too, with intricate designs found in pieces dating back as early as the time of Celtic settlers. Woolton also argues that brooches are markers of identity, mentioning as an example how Coco Chanel thought that “Brooches elevated both the custom and the woman wearing it, and they form a key part of a woman’s wardrobe who wants her views known.” Throughout history they have evolved and assume strong meaning, such as the red-ribbon pin we wore in support of HIV/AIDS epidemic or the Black Lives Matter movement; or the patriotic brooches worn by women during the First and Second World Wars to express patriotism and their commitment to the war effort.
In the sixth chapter, we discover the ancient iconographic power of cuffs, whose wide form gives an immediate feeling of supremacy. They were also an easy way to identify members of the same group and convenient for artists to show off their skill. Woolton believes that cuffs emerged from Africa in the Middle Stone Age era, when humans started to use animal skin as clothing and leather items as other apparel. In modern times, we have seen cuffs in the arms of Hollywood divas, and superheroes and in many high jewellery houses, such as the De Beers, which in 2002 brought the leather cuff back into fashion with a stunning leather wristlet cuff studded with a diamond, designed by Reem Pachani.
Left, Galaxy Cuff by Robinson Pelham in yellow gold dotted with diamonds. Right, Hancocks Anglesey Tiara (circa 1890), originally owned by the 5th Marquess of Anglesey, Henry Ciril Paget.
Last, Woolton takes us through the history and meaning of head ornaments, possibly the item of jewellery more connected to religious symbolism, political power and social status. Woolton argues that “A person wearing a head ornament inspires awe as they appear to float about anybody else.” It is in this last chapter that the author introduces us to wreaths, diadems, tiaras, cameos, turbans, warbonnets, hairpins, crowns and even Russian kokoshniks, a headdress worn by the peasant that was adopted by the royal family. Initially made of colourful fabric, they eventually evolved into sophisticated items embellished with all kinds of precious gems. Master jewellers like Fabergé and Bolin were commissioned to create extraordinary kokoshniks and even Cartier, Chaumet and Garrard produced versions of them. In London, Garrard made a Russian fringe tiara for Queen Alexandra’s 25th wedding anniversary in 1888. Queen Alexandra was the sister of Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, mother of Tsar Nicholas II.
If Jewels Could Talk by Carol Woolton is published by Simon & Schuster UK. Hardcover. £14.25 from Amazon and other retailers.
These and many more captivating stories wait for you in Carol Woolton’s If Jewels Could Talk, a book that you’ll probably often quote at dinners, as it is peppered with interesting facts about the role of jewellery in human history that very few people would know about. I can’t think of any other author who would have Woolton’s knowledge of the subject and the narrative skill to make it so amenable to all kinds of audiences.
Word: Julia Pasarón
Leading image: Engin Akyurt Picture of Carol Woolton: David Montgomery
The first exhibition of the American artist in the U.K.
Newport Street Gallery brings us the first exhibition of Wes Lang in the U.K. Wes Lang: The Black Paintings is a deeply moving, emotional show that lets the viewer take a glimpse into the world of the celebrated American artist.
Lang’s creativity draws from a wide range of sources, from childhood memories and ephemera he gathered and treasured as his “talismans” to icons and symbols from ancient philosophies and cultures. He is influenced by artists as diverse as Vuillard, Munnings, Bacon and Basquiat.
All these elements fuse in Lang’s art creating a dramatic universe full of playful steganography. At the centre of it all, is the wish of the artist to motivate audiences to lead fulfilling lives and to believe in themselves. The Black Paintings series in fact was created in reaction to what Lang calls “The prevailing narrative of negativity” in the world.
Left, Wes Lang, Ballad, 2023. Acrylic on linen. Right, Cloud, 2023. Acrylic on canvas.
Wes Lang: The Black Paintings features an extensive collection of works, all of them produced between 2022 and 2024. Like in a storybook, we found in this show a narrative thread that takes the viewer from one canvas to the next. The protagonists are often his signature skeletons, who he considers the heroes of the story, and who “are forced into scenarios where evil keeps popping up but never looks the same.” Through his work, Lang rejects the “Divisive Faces of Evil” in our society: money, political affiliation, commerce…
The Black Paintings show is organised so the viewers can let themselves be taken by Wes Lang onto a memorable journey of positive affirmation.
Room by room, the viewer feels increasingly hypnotised by Lang’s narrative and provocative style. Dark, sinister backgrounds alternate with lush landscapes in which the characters get increasingly together to identify and repudiate evil, regardless of the face it chooses to present.
It is here that we see the influence in Lang’s art of eastern spiritual philosophies to which his mother introduced him, mainly Tao Te Ching, the central Taoist text, and the lectures of the American spiritual guru, Ram Dass. At the end of viewing The Black Paintings, Lang says his intention is that we realise “that all this noise and all these divisive faces of evil that we’re told matter, don’t have to consume your mind and the way you feel about the world.”
The positive message in the series is underpinned by Lang’s deep belief that “we are born as vessels of love, and we are all just one gigantic soul that’s all interconnected. And so I set out to make this body of work show this belief.”
Author: Julia Pasarón
Wes Lang: The Black Paintings Newport Street Gallery 1 Newport St. London SE11 6AJ. More details, HERE.
Read our full interview with Wes Lang in our winter issue, available in our online store and quality newsagents in the UK. A shorter version is available HERE.
Alongside the shot at Newport Street Gallery, 96 works on paper by Wes Lang are on show at HENI Gallery (6-10 Lexington St. London W1F 0LE) until 22nd November 2024. More details, HERE.
Opening image: from Wes Lang, Global Resurrection, 2022. Acrylic on canvas. Image cropped from the original.
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