White Coach and Horses



So clearly the latest must-have vehicle for arriving to your wedding (judging by those parked outside Platins Photographers in Green Lanes, Harringay) has moved on from the white stretch Hummer to white carriages drawn by two white horses with ostrich plumage on their heads driven by two coachmen in top hats and Victorian caped coats. Last week there was a replica of Cinderella's glass pumpkin coach. This week's was a carriage with a white leather hood. The ladies emerge from the photographers into the December chill night wearing acres of diaphonous nylon silk - sleeveless with flounces, frills and bows - white for the bride and red or bright pink for the bridesmaids (usually groups of four or six adult ones and any number of toddling ones) and towering strappy diamonte-encrusted sandals. Not a coat between them - just the pancake makeup and hairpieces to protect them from the cold. The men of these parties look decidedly bland by comparison in ordinary black lounge suits. Not even  a frilled shirt or cummerbund. The carriages attract large groups of onlookers photographing, talking to the coachmen and stroking the horses.

I wonder if the vehicle hire company also provide the black horse-drawn hearses for traditional funerals.

Known

A familiar voice - deep female - said excuse me as she passed me on the escalator. A woman with brown hair and an expensive sheepskin coat walked down past me. It was Amanada Donohoe. We got on the tube - she was in the next door carriage, visible through the glass partitions. She sat slightly sideways with her hand partially obscuring her face and nobody noticed her.

Stories

The girl says to her Spanish boyfriend, She's quite selective about her novels. She won't read anything trashy or stuff that isn't her sort of story.

What's her kind of story I wonder. I'm not sure I have a kind of story. I'll read all sorts of things. My mother liked stories about lives (fictional diaries and letters, stories of coming through struggles and families). I have her collection of women-authored novels. Many with the dark green spines of Virago Press. I like detective novels - started young when Pops used to read me Josephine Tey novels standing on a chair beside the bunk bed (surprisingly he would fall asleep mid-sentence quite often and have to be coaxed awake and prompted as to where he trailed off. We didn't like Agatha Christie to read though, preferred it on the screen. I'm currently reading Scandinavian crime fiction. I'll read almost anything else though - historic, prehistoric, things my mother would like, thriller, modern, contemporary, American, sci-fi, translations, graphic. Don't generally do chick lit or Mills and Boon.  I like getting recommendations but don't always agree that I like them. Good writing or a gripping read is the key. I've only stopped in the middle of two novels - American Psycho and The Dirty Havana Trilogy. Too violent, and too much sex with sour milk, respectively. I did manage to finish On The Road though, which I found excruciatingly boring. What kind is your story?

How come?

Hair generally seems to grow downwards (unless very short or unruly) - head hair being the main example except for cow licked or particularly thickly stranded, leg hair, arm hair, eyebrows (apart from the wild unruly variety sported by occasional older gentlemen), even the unmentionable pubes. So standing squashed between two tall hairy men on the tube this afternoon  I was surprised to realise that chest hair (based on my unscientific survey of two white middle-aged males) grows upwards. Why is this? And how come I've only just noticed this now? I'm normally quite observant!

Tomb of the lost craftsman

Grayson Perry exhibition at the British Museum. Absolutely impossible to get in without buying a ticket in advance (I rolled up late one Saturday expecting to be able to get in and couldn't) - so we had friday evening after work tickets. The covered atrium's lighting was low and gave a calming atmosphere good for reverence - excellence on the eyes after a day in harsh strip lighting.

The exhibition had Grayson Perry's pots and other ceramic work displayed with objects from the British Museum that inspired/influenced him. I had not been aware of his work in other media and forms than the large pots. Weird and wonderful objects both modern and ancient - a good earring hanging off a dried earlobe, flag made by a ghanian tribe featuring two White men decapitated by two tribesmen, oil jar in the shape of men's genitals amongst an eclectic mix of other things.

Afterwards we had a drink in the restaurant high up near the roof of the atrium. Coming down later watched mice race round the floor near the cafe area.

Movember

(Moustache growing month for men's health awareness particularly prostate cancer)
There is quite a bit of this going on at work. Started off with those shadows appearing on colleagues faces. The stage where it looks more like slovenliness than any purposeful endeavour. This lasts longer than you'd think. Then when the five o'clock shadow has developed into something more whiskery the sculpting can begin. This year there is a much greater focus on the dropped handlebar variety than a mere bit of top lip hair. Now, three weeks in they are starting to really thicken up. Channelling the 1970s. Proper big dark long haired moustaches. No pencil lines, no stubbly affairs. Rather ageing on the whole, but worthy.

Alice

Interviewing olympic volunteers next candidate was called Alice - out of all those waiting he picked out a woman with bright blond hair and guessed her to be the one. And it was. I have known one Alice and she too had bright blond hair (long, straight) and pink national health glasses, often worn with a patch over her lazy eye. Maybe we have to thank Lewis Carroll for this stereotype.

Remember Remember




Tottenham folks love fireworks - especially displays set off in their backyards (or occassionally front gardens, and even more occassionally across the street aimed at the buses going past) - all around the pop, crack and fizz of fireworks whizzzing into the sky through the misty drizzle. The supermarket was doing a brisk trade on their fireworks counter when I was in there at 4pm today. I've been leaning out the window craning my neck 180 degrees. I haven't been to an organised event in a while. Last time I couldn't get anywhere near, wasn't able to see round the corner of a building, and then got caught up in a crush trying to get away again afterwards.

Parents

Fat bottomed man in white chinos and a navy linen double vented jacket pushes the buggy while his bedraggled wife walks alongside. He is out of practice driving the buggy and gets caught on all obstacles along the the path - wheels trapped on a plastic bottle, jammed against the curb, tangled in a plastic bag. He looks uncomfortable and the buggy is unwieldy in his control. "He's off," he says proudly examining his son, "oh...no he isn't," he says defeated. Parents with a screamingly tired baby refusing to sleep perhaps.

Ceramics class - 1st half term




Testing - rolling the damp clay in ball clay and then forming it by pressing out from the inside until the surface cracks. I'm trying to stretch it until it breaks through all the clay - to the point of destruction but not quite. Still trying to figure out how to use it. Also testing a technique of putting a thin strip of porcelain onto a stoneware body - the difference in shrinkage makes the porcelain crack in firing because it shrinks more than the stoneware. And a second wavy urn in black clay. Trying to get some pink on it but not too much - but would have liked a bit more than this. Black clay body is quite dramatic and strangely dry to work with.

Outside

Out of the office window in the near distance there are two men setting up scaffolding on the top of a building with a green dome topped by an elaborate weather vane. Scaffolding poles stick up all around it. The man below passes planks up to the man at the top - who almost looks to be walking on air.  Highlighted in sparkling sunshine against a dark grey sky that is showering. Behind our office there is probably a rainbow. 

4 Exhibitions

Tate Modern
Tacita Dean - Turbine Hall - film



Billed as a love letter to film - proper film as opposed to digital - clear, strong colours, unpixilated, able to be superimposed and sliced together. Large screen, space for people to lie down in front of it, which they did. Gathered people staring up at it - huge vertical screen. Darkened around to enable it to be seen better.

Gerhard Richter - retrospective
Crowded exhibition. I don't know why but I was amazed that he did both super-realistic paintings from photos and very abstract. Really like the 70s paint swatch painting (it reminded me of my old bathroom at my parent's house - Dad and I spent an afternoon papering it with paint swatches - it made for a very colourful two walls - great for staring at during a long soak). Also the huge canvases with thick layers which were pulled across the canvas - textured, colour contasting between layers.

Tate Britain
Barry Flanagan
Very quiet. Early Flanagan (pre-hare sculptures) - lots of use of formless material (canvas, sand, rope) - large columns made of canvas filled with sand to give them structure, sticks tied together - sticks and coloured fabric. Liked the colour of rope and sand against the parquet floor. Defying physics - canvas help up against the wall like a painting using sticks. Carving in stone that follows the seams in the rock - imagery that evokes the stylised pictues used by early humans.

Apocalypse - John Martin
While Barry Flanagan was empty and therefore easy to look properly, Apocalypse was packed. The underground poster was quite striking and made me want to see the exhibition. Poplular pictures, very commercial artist - he often painting several versions of the same picture and then made an etching for further sales. This exhibition showed multiples of the same image together. He cottoned on to an idea of slightly off-centre composition based in a circular or spiral shape, backgrounds were pale, foregrounds dark. Lots of drama. But the composition was all too similar and in the end I found it too commercial. Would have preferred to see only a couple rather than several rooms full. The quantity didn't increase the drama, instead making it seem repetative and formulaic.

Announcer

Tube train said 6 mins. Lady on station was muttering into her tannoy  but don't be sad there might be one sooner. Got on the walkie talkie to HQ who said one was coming in 2. 2 minutes ladies and gentlemen, don't know where it will be going though, might be high barnet, might be edgware, might be Majorca. I held onto that thought - what joy if Majorca lay at the end of the northern line. Could do with some sand, sea and sangria. 

Unusual journeys by tube

I don't know anywhere else  on the tube network where two trains swing alarmingly close together apart from southbound at finsbury park where Victoria line and piccadilly line trains leaving the station together provide a momentary coming together and view of fellow passengers following a different route.

Circle line minutes are more drawn out (ie longer) than Victoria line minutes. Is this because it goes through west London which has a more relaxed attitude than north London? 

Fewer suits on the hammersmith and city line than Victoria line or northern line and more likely to not be wearing a necktie. More arty women and men who look like computer geeks or college lecturers. Perhaps I've travelled The bank route for too long and have become overly used to the hard city banking fraternity. These are more my people - more art school and less uptight highly strung.

Indian Summer

Warm wind blows hot air through trees with browning leaves. Conker shells strew the pavements. They've stripped the road surface ready for new Tarmac and that tary smell hangs in the air. Sit in the garden after work until the biting insects get too bad. It's dark by 7.20. A bat swoops silently looping the loop.

Stinky socks

If your socks or trainers are too smelly to keep inside the room, and therefore must be aired on the windowsill, isn't it time to either a) wash them, or b) chuck them out and get a new pair?

Open House 2011

On the way home from work, if I catch a bus outside Liverpool Street up Kingsland Road, just before passing Shoreditch Church there are two tube carriages high up on top of a building. Never have known what they were used for or how they got there. This Open House they were open for viewing.




Up a steep wet spiral staircase is a set of studios set up on a rooftop - 4 old tube carriages are sited up there - two on top of lower structures. They cost the collective £50 each. Outside they are decorated. Inside they are simple spaces divided up into desk spaces used by graffic designers, music makers and craft people. The carriages are those old ones with wooden slatted floors and handles to dangle off which are no longer on tube trains. The view looks out over the buildings towards Liverpool Street and the east. Large sky, large urbanscape. A view and space that I would find quite motivating for working in.

Autumn

Spiders working overtime making webs stringing across the entire garden and lying in wait for woozy wasps to get tangled. Biting beasties are lurking in the long grass and attack whenever I walk past (six bites on ankles today). Conkers are falling - haven't seen any but the shells are scattered under all chestnut trees. Inbetween weather - never sure how to dress - need a jacket on the way to work but by the afternoon its too hot. Evenings draw in.

Citizen H

Yesterday discovered there was a meeting of the Tottenham and Seven Sisters area forum - an off chance look at Haringey's website. The meeting was to talk about the recent disturbances. 

Meeting was supposed to start at 6.30. Most of the people there were regular attendees chatting in groups, or local elected members. A small spattering of residents. 

Managing a consulting with the public meeting:

1. Advertise your meeting widely in advance
2. Signpost properly at the venue
3. Provide at least minimal refreshment (some water)
4. Start on time and keep to the agenda (this meeting started at 6.39 and by the time it was supposed to have finished it was only on the second agenda item)
5. If you say five minutes for intro, stick to it
6. Try to make the discussion questions manageable in the timeframe
7. Set the context within which the discussion must be held first - talk about resources, cuts, political climate - the discussion may then come from a position of realism 

I was disappointed that the discussions didn't get deep enough into practical solutions or thought enough about building the future - either realistically or fantastically - a good facilitator could have generated a better discussion from our table, and judging by the feedback from other tables, from other groups as well. It all was a little too much like work, not fun enough for leisure time.

Tube travel

The man opposite is 60 wearing cargo pants and two handfuls of unsubtle silver rings - claws holding an ace of spades, cows head with horns and others that might come from a heavy metal jewellers in Camden lock. He's got some kind of African ceremonial stick with a skull on top. People can't stop staring at him. He stares at his hands from under the wide brim of his hat. After his distraction gets off I'm staring at   alabaster legs with two ruddy ovals at the top. They belong to a smartly dressed woman with matching jade necklace and earrings. Looking closer it's holes in both knees of her tights. Each knee is ruddy. She must have fallen. The holes look even though, almost like they were done deliberately. Perhaps her knees get hot and when she is standing the holes are under her skirt.