Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away

 art  No Responses »
Apr 182011
 

lowry 700x517 Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away

Sir has chal­lenged Tate to give its LS Lowry paint­ings away, say­ing it rarely hangs them in Lon­don, siad the BBC.

He said it was “a shame ver­ging on the ini­quit­ous” that for­eign vis­it­ors to the cap­ital should not see them.

Tate owns seven Lowry paint­ings. It also owns 16 draw­ings and prints that can be viewed, by appoint­ment, at London’s Tate Bri­tain. It said it planned to include Lowry paint­ings as part of Tate Britain’s revamp, due to fin­ish in 2013.

The artist, who died in 1976, is known for his crowd scenes depict­ing indus­trial life in the towns of north-west England.

Sir Ian, on his web­site, asked,

Why should it mat­ter that the Tate Gal­lery in Lon­don (with its 23 Lowry’s) has chosen not to dis­play any of them for many years?  His pop­ular­ity needs no offi­cial endorse­ment from the Tate but it is a shame ver­ging on the ini­quit­ous that for­eign vis­it­ors to Lon­don shouldn’t have access to the painter Eng­lish people like more than most others.

Over the years, silly lies have been thrown around – that  Lowry was only a Sunday painter, an ama­teur, untrained, naïve.  The Tate’s cur­rent apo­lo­gist tries a new attack in the film: Lowry’s pop­ular­ity is why the gal­lery doesn’t show his work!  His fans are his problem.

If the Tate feels no respons­ib­il­ity to give the art-viewing pub­lic their favour­ite paint­ers to view, per­haps they could let their stash go else­where, pass them on to a gal­lery like the Lowry, who share their vis­it­ors’ tastes.  Lowry’s home in Pendle­bury, where he lived and painted over 40 years, is still stand­ing, empty, boarded-up and unmarked by a long-overdue blue plaque.  Many of the Tate’s pic­tures were painted in the front upper room.  It could make a unique addi­tion to the Tate brand of museums.

Mar­ket Scene, North­ern Town by L.S.Lowry, 1939, Lowry Centre, Salford Quays

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  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away
  • wp socializer sprite mask 16px Sir Ian McKellen tells the Tate to give its Lowry paintings away

Best Hung Theatre Personalities 2010 — The Full Monty!

 theatre  No Responses »
Dec 252010
 

daniel radcliffe equus Best Hung Theatre Personalities 2010 The Full Monty!In Mark Shenton’s excel­lent, illu­min­at­ing and enter­tain­ing blog for the Stage, “Shenton’s View”, he has fol­lowed up his blog on London’s Unsung The­at­rical Her­oes with the Best Hung list!

When I pos­ted my blog on Monday about London’s unsung the­at­rical her­oes, one of those I named wrote to thank me — but quipped, “Damn, I thought for a moment I’d made it onto your ‘best hung theatre per­son­al­it­ies 2010’ list.”

Now I know that I recently wrote here about crit­ics get­ting too per­sonal in reviews, fol­low­ing the furore that engulfed Alastair Macaulay of the New York Times for his char­ac­ter­isa­tion of the Sugar Plum Fairy in a New York City Bal­let pro­duc­tion of The hav­ing con­sumed too many sugar plums her­self, but as Michael Cove­ney sug­ges­ted in his blog on Tues­day, “A per­former gets on a stage and per­forms.… [con­tinue reading]

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Richard Eyre: You can’t be stupid and a good actor. You may be inarticulate, you may not be highly educated, but all good actors are quick-witted, some of them dazzlingly so.

 interview, theatre  1 Response »
Nov 292010
 

Andrew Dickson’s long and reveal­ing inter­view with dir­ector and National Theatre boss in :

Eyre’s jour­ney into theatre left him with some­thing dir­ect­ors are not always known for: a deep respect for, and sym­pathy with, act­ors. He remem­bers the work of the aris­to­cratic (and nearly for­got­ten) star John Neville with some­thing approach­ing awe, and some of the most tender moments in his mem­oir relate Eyre’s admir­a­tion for the people who go on stage night after night: the instinct­ive, almost off­hand bril­liance of , the sys­tem­atic, fas­ti­di­ous approach of Ian McK­el­len – whose per­form­ances, writes Eyre, “form like crys­tals in a sat­ur­ated solution”.

JonathanPryce2007 Richard Eyre: You cant be stupid and a good actor. You may be inarticulate, you may not be highly educated, but all good actors are quick witted, some of them dazzlingly so.
Image via Wiki­pe­dia

Eyre claims to be sus­pi­cious of dir­ect­orial flair (“it’s like the swish­ing of a cloak, often at the expense of the piece”); if his pro­duc­tions have a sig­na­ture touch, it’s his nuanced hand­ling of act­ors.… [con­tinue reading]

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