London : January 9th 2011

Today we started off our day by going to Trafalgar Square. It was definitely a sight to see, there were many sculptures, a lovely water fountain in the middle, and with surrounding buildings with amazing architecture. We spent some time talking about the Fourth Plinth, which is currently Nelson's Ship in a Bottle by Yinka Shonibare which has been there since May of 2010. Some of the topics we touched on were interesting to think about. We talked about how the sails resemble textiles and were probably done this way to symbolize trade. We also talked about how Britain is multicultural and is probably due to a lot of trading. I think this sculpture was appropriate for this monument, to show the trade between cultures and how trade in return had it's effects on Britain's culture. I have looked at recent examples of the sculptures that might be considered for the next few years and i don't think they send as good of message as the one now does. We shall see which ones are chosen soon.

In the afternoon we went to the National Gallery. One of the highlights of this museum for me was the Bridget Riley exhibit. I was surprised to see work like hers in this museum. I liked looking at her pieces that were directly painted on the wall. I also enjoyed how the rooms were set up, continuing to different artists in each room, through the years. Some of my favorite artists to see in these rooms were Renoir, Monet, Van Gogh, and Degas. I find it is also fascinating to finally see artwork in person that you have studied over and over again in school. I like having these realizations of "oh that's why we studied this" or realizing the actual size and color of these paintings that you often lose in reproductions. The painting The Ambassadors by Hans Holbein was also interesting to see. I remembered learning about this piece in school but this is a perfect example of an artwork that just isn't the same unless you see it in person. When you view this piece from the right side the image becomes more in focus, making the skull on the bottom less skewed.

Our final stop for the day was at the ICA - Bloomberg New Contemporaries. This was one of my least favorite galleries so far. In my opinion i was not crazy about the setup of the gallery and how crowded the artworks were in the rooms. It made it harder to concentrate on all the  different artworks. I found myself distracted by some and skipping over others because of how much was going on in one given room. I did find some pieces that stood out enough to make me want to stop and concentrate on them. One of them was by Chris Shaw Hughes called Sublimation. This was an Offset carbon drawing. I loved the amazing detail in his carbon drawing, if i didn't know any better i would have thought it was a photograph. This picture i think could have easily been over looked because there was so much going on next to it, between a video projection playing and crowed by other artwork on the wall. I also enjoyed Sophie Eagles video playing on the other side of the room. This was called Collapse and was digital creation of a pillar, made up of diamond forms, that collapsed over and then would repeat again from beginning.