Soutine, Modigliani and Cezanne - Portraits Exhibitions

It seems to be portraits season in London at the moment, with three major portraits exhibitions open at the same time: Soutine at the Courtauld, Modigliani at Tate Modern and Cezanne at the National Portrait Gallery. I've no idea why this is the year of the portrait (apparently) but it's nice to see the very different treatments of the portrait by three different artists who didn't live so far apart.

The Soutine exhibition is, as ever, rather bijou, using the usual two rooms at the top of the Courtauld Gallery. The price of entry to the exhibition is included in the general entry ticket so, as well as looking at the Soutines, you can see the rather impressive Courtauld collection as well (and don't forget the early Renaissance works on the ground floor that too many people seem to walk past - there are three Fra Angelico panels in there).

My abiding impression of the Soutine portraits is gorgeous colours and distorted bodies and faces. The portraits are of hotel and restaurant workers and, probably, some in domestic service, all the opposite of the type of people who usually have their portraits painted. Some seem to be humble whereas others swagger and you probably wouldn't want to meet them in a dark alley. One of my favourites was the narrow-faced and big eared pastry chef in his acres of uniform umpteen times too big for him, shrinking away from the artist and slightly concerned. Of course, all that white isn't necessarily white as you see all different colours smeared into the overalls. There are a few other pastry chef paintings, seemingly of different sitters but I liked this one.

Another painting I liked was this one of a hotel worker described as having different jobs (Soutine, apparently, rarely titled his paintings so dealers gave different names to them). There are actually four different painting of this bloke, two with hands on hips, one with hands lying flat on his thighs and one close-up. In each the facial features are distorted but he wears the same uniform. Apparently he was't a good sitter and got bored very quickly and started fidgeting. I like knowing things like that about portrait sitters - it helps to bring them alive. From the pose and expression I can well understand it in his case, too.

A much bigger exhibition is the series of portraits by Madiglioni at Tate Modern on the other side of the river from the Courtauld and a bit further downstream.

It was a very busy exhibition when I visited so I really need to go back again to get a closer look at the paintings. My overall impression was of a lack of eyes in any of the portraits - eyes left blank or painted in black but few depictions of eyes. There was a quote somewhere from Modigliani to the effect that he'd paint in the sitters eyes when he had seen his or her soul. That's an interesting supposition but I wonder whether he just found them difficult to portray in a non-mannered way so avoided the problem. I'd be tempted to do that.

There's a nice selection of paintings in a big exhibition, nudes and society women, workmen to gentlemen. A bit of this and a bit of that. There's even an opportunity to try out a virtual reality headset but I didn't bother because of the queue, maybe next time.

The extended and simplified shapes of bodies and features was a bit odd but eventually drew me in. What was missing - although I may have passed them due to the crowds - were early works before he developed his style that demonstrated that he actually was an excellent draughtsman and knew how to draw and paint 'properly', that would help us understand how he developed his own style. Or did he just launch his 'style' and start selling paintings that encouraged his to keep using the style.

In an odd way it's both a bit repelling and attractive at the same time, the elongated figures, faces and features, no real sense of proportion in many of the paintings and no clear rationale for what he chose to do. Does that matter? The further into the exhibition I went the more compelled I felt to look and appreciate, to wonder and to start making up stories about the sitters. It's worth taking a close look at the paintings, all with a high finish, but wonder why he chose an elongated nose and tiny eyes here or an exaggerated pose there?

I certainly want a second viewing and intend to go back when, hopefully it is less busy. I'll leave you with a self-portrait of the man himself with blacked out eyes.

An exhibition that I'd already seen in Paris was the Cezanne portraits exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. I first saw it at the Musee D'Orsay in Paris back in September, before it travelled to London. It heads off to Washington after London.

When I say i'd already seen this exhibition, that's not entirely true. What I should say is that I'd *most* of this exhibition before since it's not exactly the same - some of the paintings on show in Paris aren't on show here, and some are shown here that weren't on show in Paris. The most obvious are some rather cold paintings of the artists's son that I hadn't seen before.

The central paintings are, of course, here, including the boy in the red waistcoat that is, again, the poster for the exhibition. I have to say that, much as I love the D'Orsay, I preferred the layout of the paintings in the National Portrait Gallery which gave them more space and seemed less crowded despite being just as busy. On the other hand, the shop in the D'Orsay had more themed merchandise and cards than the National Portrait Gallery ( I notice such things).

Having done a painting course inbetweenseeing the exhibition for the first and second times, I looked at the paintings with a different eye, looking at the obvious brush strokes in some paintings and wondering what sort of brush he used and wondered why some brush-strokes go *that* way while others go *this* way. If you're interested in painting then this is an excellent exhibition to visit to get some ideas on technique as well as style.

If I could only go to one of these exhibitions then I'd definitely choose Cezanne - without him then the other two painters probably wouldn't have developed their distinctive styles. Well done Mt Cezanne and, especially, your long-suffering wife whom you kept on painting.

The Plastic Bag Awards 2017

It's that time of year again when awards are awarded, winners are overjoyed and losers try to smile through their tears but let's not get sentimental since there can be only one winner (no tied votes here). Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Plastic Bag Awards for 2017, in other words, the Baggies!

Best Theatre - Shakespeare

This has been a poor year for Shakespeare in the Plastic Bag and there are only two nominees in this category. Both are worthy to be nominated but neither were perfect productions.

'Hamlet' at the Almeida Theatre
'The Tempest' at the Barbican Theatre

I liked the new production of 'Hamlet' with Andrew Scott right up until the made-up ending scene and I liked Simon Russell Beale as Prospero and I loved the fluidity of the electronic flying Ariel but it wasn't really all that smooth. So, neither ticked all the boxes, but the Baggie goes to 'Hamlet'.

Best Theatre - Drama

There were some very powerful productions on stage in 2017 and the list of nominees could easily have been expanded but it's limited to five:

'The Glass Menagerie' at the Duke of York's Theatre
'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf' at the Harold Pinter Theatre
'The Ferryman' at the Gielgud Theatre
'Angels in America' (both parts) at the National Theatre
'Young Marx' at the Bridge Theatre

Imelda Staunton and Paddy Considine both gave astonishing performances in 'Who's Afraid' and 'Ferryman' respectively and 'Angels' was a great ensemble performance across both parts of the play. 'Menagerie' and 'Marx' both had their great moments in very different types of play. The award must go to 'The Ferryman' for the excellent writing and poetry in the lines, the great performances and the shocks and twists and turns when least expected.

Best Theatre - Musical

The West End still seems to be full of musicals that have been on forever or jukebox musicals but there are still some gems with revivals and even new musicals being written and produced. The nominees are:

'Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill' at Wyndham's Theatre
'The Life' at Southwark Playhouse
'Follies' at the National Theatre
'42nd Street' at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
'Everybody's Talking About Jamie' at the Apollo Theatre

If there was an award for new musical it would go to 'Jamie' and new one full of life and love and and joy but it's up against stiff competition this year. It was great, as always, to see Sharon D Clarke in 'The Life' and be introduced to new talent T'Sham Williams, and Audra McDonald was astonishing in 'Lady Day. However, the winner has to be the great production of 'Follies' at the National Theatre and the excellent performances by Imelda Staunton and Janie Dee.

Best Entertainment

An 'entertainment' is a performance that doesn't really fit into any of the other categories, such as one-man/woman shows, readings and cabaret. There are only three nominations this year:

'Miss Hope Springs' at the Wigmore Halls
'Bent' at the National Theatre
'A Poem for Every Day of the Year' at the National Theatre

The winner was easy to pick for the harrowing and powerful performance of a staged reading of 'Bent' at the National Theatre, a production I won't soon forget.

Best Gig

There was a time when I'd go to a gig a couple of times a month (or more) but these days it's a much rarer thing. There are only three nominations:

Suzanne Vega at the London Palladium
Bananarama at Hammersmith
The Unthanks at the Royal Festival Hall

It is always a joy to see Suzanne Vega play live and last year was the anniversary shows for 'Solitude Standing' and '99.9C' in which she played both albums all the way through. The Unthanks gave a veery moving performance with an orchestra as backing band and there were some astonishing arrangements of their songs. But the Baggie must go to those three mad girls in Bananarama who brought joy to Hammersmith and made us all young again. Keep it up girls!

Best Dance

I saw a lot of dance in 2017, with lots of triple bills of ballets as well as full length performances. Two Wayne McGregor's ('Woolf' and 'Codes') and both were excellent and innovative. Two one-act ballets from separate triple bills at the Royal Opera House really stood out as well as an innovative production of the story of 'Alice'.

'Woolf Works' at the Royal Opera House
'Tree of Codes' at Sadler's Wells
'Rubies' as part of the 'Jewels' triple bill at the Royal Opera House
'Flight Pattern' as part of a triple bill at the Royal Opera House
'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' at the Royal Opera House

The judging panel found this to be a very difficult decision but they were kept locked away until they could hand over an envelope with one title in it. That title was 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' for the astonishing performances, the innovative designs and the sheer wonder and fun of the thing. Well done Royal Ballet!

Best Exhibition

This category was a difficult one to narrow down the nominees from the large number of really good exhibitions visited this year, but here are the final nominations:

'Revolution: Russian Art 1917 - 1932' at the Royal Academy
'Michelangelo & Sebastiano' at the National Gallery
'Raphael: The Drawings' at the Ashmolean Museum
'Lawrence Alma-Tadema: At Home In Antiquity' at Leighton House Museum
'Cézanne Portraits' at Musee D'Orsay and the National Portrait Gallery

It was great to see artists whose works I;m very familiar with next to those of artists I've never heard of before and wondering why not? Seeing classics from the High Renaissance and revolutionary works from the last century and then seeing painting after painting by an artist who hasn't had his own exhibition in over 30 years. So much to see and wonder at. However, the Baggie goes Mr Cezanne and his portraits of family and friends that I saw both at Musee D'Orsay and at the National Portrait Gallery.

Best Film

Given the many different film genres it's probably unfair to try to compare films showing wild leaps of imagination next to documentaries but there's only one category for film I'm afraid. The nominees are:

'La La Land'
'Wonder Woman'
'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2'
'Here To Be Heard: The Story of The Slits'
'Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World'

'La La Land' was a joy and a sadness, 'Wonder Woman' was an inspiration and 'Guardians' was just daft fun. 'The Slits' told a story I was partially familiar with but from a different perspective and 'Rumble' told a story I wasn't familiar with at all and I learned so much from it. The winner has to be 'Here To Be Heard: The Story of The Slits' because I go back so many years with those women. Well done!

And there you have it, the Baggies for 2017! I wonder what 2018 will be like?

'Portraits by Cezanne' at Musee D'Orsay, Paris

On my recent trip to Paris I saw the 'Portraits by Cezanne' exhibition at Musee D'Orsay which opens at the National Portrait Gallery in London in October. That gives me another opportunity to see this excellent exhibition.

The exhibition starts off, as you'd expect, with early portraits as Cezanne found his own style. There were a few portraits of his uncle differentiated by wearing different hats, something he seems to do with his own later self-portraits, wearing hats of various shapes and colours. The consistent thing is the bushy beard, both for his uncle and himself. He's not the poster-boy for the exhibition however, that's reserved for 'Boy in the Red Waistcoat' which works really well with the splash of vivid red to liven up the colour palette.

To illustrate Cezanne's 'hats maketh the man' approach, I particularly liked his 'Self-portrait with a White Hat' with Cezanne looking straight out at the viewer wearing a white hat of sorts - or is it a bandanna tied around his head? Hair and beard are well kept and under control unlike in the self-portrait I'm more familiar with in the National Gallery in London. That painting is on loan to this exhibition and it was nice to see it again. I think I prefer the self-portrait with the white hat though, showing the artist in his prime, gazing out at the viewer in three-quarter pose, a man assured of himself and in control of his art.

As well as painting his own portrait, Cezanne painted his wife endlessly. There are half a dozen portraits of Madame Cezanne in the exhibition, the poor, long-suffering wife. I could well imagine her saying, 'ok, just another few minutes but I really need to make the dinner...' as Cezanne started yet another portrait.

Another portrait I particularly liked was 'Gustave Geffroy' from around 1896, with the good Monsieur Geffroy sitting in front of his book-case with books scattered on his desk. I suspect he's copying favourite passages into his notebook to keep them with him. The first thing I noticed were the orange-spines books in the book-case and wondered if Penguin paid Cezanne a royalty for inventing its trademark colour. That took me into the painting and could examine it with different eyes.

If you don't know the sitter or his/her history, then you need something to grab your attention to pull you into the painting, and those books did it for me. I assume the catalogue explains who he was and his relationship with Cezanne but, since the catalogue was in French then I have no idea. I look forward to reading about Gustave in the National Portrait Gallery catalogue.

Another portrait I loved was the one of Maggie Smith or, rather, 'Woman in Blue' to give the painting it's true title. As soon as I saw this one I thought of Maggie and still do. I can just see her sitting at a table waiting to be served a glass of sherry and sighing because of the wait. The slight downward glance and the angle of the hat, the plain blue jacket and dress against the colourful tablecloth all serve to give the painting a slight air of sadness, but I assume a momentary sadness. I'm sure she'll perk uo when the sherry is delivered.

It's a very simple portrait that cries out for a story to be draped around it and I hope the National Portrait Gallery version of the catalogue will do that. I want to know who she is and what was going on in her life at the time of the portrait.

One of the final portraits is another self-portrait by Monsieur Cezanne, this time as an old man whose beard has turned grey and he's gone all trendy by shaving it into a goatee beard. A large floppy beret tops off the portrait. The robust, beefy man of the earlier self-portraits has shrunk a bit with age but he's still using hats to cover his baldness. I looked at this portrait and thought old man and then wondered why he bothered to shave the sides of his beard? Was he still vain at that age? was it the fashion at the time? I don't know, but after all the earlier fully bearded portraits it did rather stand out for me.

I didn't realise that Cezanne was such a portraitist until this exhibition - I usually associate him in my head as a landscape artist because that's the genre I've mainly seen in his paintings. This exhibition shines a new light on him. That's always a good thing.

The exhibition opens at the National Portrait Gallery in London on 26 October and I'd certainly recommend it. I'll be going again to say 'bonjour' to Monsieur Cezanne.

'The Encounter: Drawings from Leonardo to Rembrandt' at the National Portrait Gallery

The current drawings exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery proudly proclaims we'll see works by artists from Leonardo to Rembrandt and that's what we get. We only get one drawing each by those big name artists and there's a goodly selection of Holbeins (as there would be) but it was the lesser known drawers that I found fascinating and it's them that I'll focus on. Not lesser know artists, for they are great masters, but not necessarily known for their drawings.

The first one I noticed was 'Man Wearing A Cap' by Filipino Lippi (the son of Fra Filippo Lippi). I've seen his glorious paintings in the National gallery and elsewhere but I've never thought of him as a drawer in any medium. That's clearly daft since he must have drawn to design his paintings but thinking of him sitting in his studio or in a tavern sketching away is something I've never considered. It's the same thing for Benozzo Gozzoli and his small drawing of a 'Boy with Curly Hair' - Gozzoli painted jewel-like panels and frescoes but he also drew.

I never expected to see drawings by Gozzoli or Lippi and that's why I enjoyed this exhibition so much. It gives us a glimpse into another side of artists we're familiar with but haven't considered in this way before. Was it just part of the job or was it recreation for these artists? Did they draw too relax or was it to collect faces and bodies to use in their painted works?

Another unexpected thrill was to see a drawing of a 'Woman Wearing A Hood' by Domenico Ghirlandaio. I love Ghirlandaio's series of frescoes around the high altar in Santa Maria Novella in Florence, with the variety of scenes and bright colours making the altar shimmer. There are lots of faces in those frescoes - they're full of crowds - and now I'll be wondering if this woman is one of them. Who is she and where did Ghirlandaio see her? Maybe he saw her in a market and wanted to catch her slight air of solemnity thinking that expression would look good in whatever work he was currently painting. Who knows?

One of the quotes on the walls around the exhibition was attributed to Leonardo who says, "Do you not see that among the beauties of mankind it is a very beautiful face which arrests passers-by and not their rich adornments." In a real sense, all faces are beautiful.

An artist I'd never heard of is Francesco Salviati and he's represented by 'Young Man Looking to His Left' which is exactly what he's doing. It's a lovely, delicate drawing and is more than a sketch - some serious work went into this drawing with all it's delicate shading. Look at that ear and then ruffle his hair. I wonder why Salviati wanted him looking to his left but not simply turning his head - what was he trying to capture? I'll never know.

There are, of course, a lot more drawings and artists in the exhibition than these I mention. There's a series of drawings by Holbein, almost a court-ful of Tudor faces and clothes, from the royal collection. It's odd to think that we all look broadly the same as people did all those centuries ago. I wonder if some enterprising soul will put on an exhibition of 20th and 21st Century drawings in a few hundred years time? Wouldn't that be something?

I'll close with one final drawing, this time by Leonardo who everyone knows as a drawer of rare distinction, and here's his 'Study of a Nude Man'.

The final quote on the wall, just as you exit, is from Cennino Cennini who wrote 'The Craftsman's Handbook' in around 1400. His words are wise:

"Do not fail, as you go on, to draw something every day, for no matter how little it is it will be well worth while, and will do you a world of good."

'Picasso Portraits' at the National Portrait Gallery

We took advantage of the 'Friday late' at the National Portrait Gallery to see the new exhibition 'Picasso Portraits'. I quite like going to 'lates' on a Friday at various galleries and museums because they tend to be less crowded that during daytimes but this exhibition was still quite crowded so it's clearly a hot ticket.

The exhibition's on until February so there's plenty of time to catch it. It focuses on self-portraits and portraits Picasso's family and friends in a wide range of media and styles throughout his long life. There seemed to be a lot of paintings and drawings from private collections so this is a nice opportunity to see works that we otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to see.

The first painting you see as you enter the exhibition - because it's straight in front of you - is 'Self-portrait with Palette' from 1906, a painting of the young Picasso who was just starting to become well known. It's a simple self-portrait really, just him dressed plainly and with a plain background and that's possibly what makes it so striking since the only thing to focus on is his face and those exotic eyebrows. He uses the traditional thing of showing himself with the tools of his trade, the palette with some smears of colour, and i wonder how many other artists over the centuries have done the very same thing? But where is his brush?

This is followed by roughly sketched portraits of friends, of thickly worked oil portraits and some jokey portraits, all in different styles and different media as he experimented and challenged himself.

A more 'traditional' portrait is one of his wife, a three quarter pose with Olga gazing away to the side, not engaged with her husband at all. She has a very impassive face in this portrait in contrast to the busy-ness of her jacket and dress with the folds and creases lightly hanging off her. Their marriage was deteriorating when this was painted and it certainly projects a cool atmosphere. I wonder how long it took him to complete this painting?

Many of the paintings are of the women in his life, the ongoing love affairs as they came and went, and not all are terribly flattering. They were his muses as well as lovers and contributed to his continually developing and evolving art.

A painting that grabbed my attention was 'Woman in a Yellow Armchair' (Dora Maar) from 1932 in which Picasso moves away from anything like a graphic reproduction of his sitter and, instead, invests in simple shapes and blocks of colour. It instantly made me think of Matisse and of course, Picasso and Matisse were friends and rivals - remove the figurative elements of the painting and you've almost got Matisse's 'The Snail'. Look at all that rich, warm colour and then notice the simple black and white of the painting on the wall behind the armchair which, once you've noticed it it keeps drawing the eye. Is he, perhaps, suggesting that life is the true art, not the bits of canvas and paper we stick on walls?

The last love of Picasso's life was Jacqueline, whom he married and lived out his last years with. His colour palette changes in those years and I was fascinated by a large painting of her called 'Woman by a Window' in shades of grey, green and brown. It's a complex mixture of shapes slotted together to create the form of a beautiful woman with a rather delicate face, sitting patiently beside a window with a glimpse of a palm tree outside. Picasso used the wooden end of his brush to scrape lines and texture into the paint of the portrait (see the lighter lines running down from the knees, these are scrape marks). Although it's quite dull in terms of the colours used and I'm definitely a creature of colour, it is quite spellbinding and made me go back to look at it several times.

Another portrait of Jacqueline (from 1962 which was one of the later works in the exhibition) was painted onto a standing piece of cut sheet metal with different portraits of his wife on each side, 'Jacqueline with a Yellow Ribbon'. I loved this one and would happily have it standing in my living room. The painting in the background of this picture is his daughter 'Maya in a Sailor Suit'.

So there you have a flavour of this exhibition. There are some lovely and some strange pieces in this exhibition and the curators have obviously put in a lot of work to try and make it different to the 'standard' Picasso exhibition that seems to pop up every few years. Focusing on portraits is a different angle to take and he certainly did enough, including some sculptures that are included in the exhibition. The exhibition is presented in conjunction with the always crowded Picasso Museum in Barcelona. Well worth seeing!

'Russia and the Arts' at the National Portrait Gallery

There's a lovely little exhibition on at the National Portrait Gallery at the moment called 'Russia and the Arts; The Age of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky'. By 'little' I mean two rooms and maybe a couple of dozen paintings but it's worth seeing. It's based on the portraits collected (and sometimes commissioned0 by Pavel Tretyakov who donated his personal collection to the city of Moscow in 1892 as the start of the national collection.

As you'd expect from the title, it's a collection of portraits of artists, musicians, poets, composers, and critics from the mid-1800s to early 1900s. There are a lot of beards on display, so much so that some paintings seemed to more about the hair on the head and chin rather than the man underneath. And yes, the portraits are mainly of men although a notable exception is the portrait of the poet Anna Akhmatova on the cover of the catalogue for the exhibition.

There are portraits of the greats you'd expect to see including three portraits hung together of a rather ill-looking Dostoyevsky, a very hairy and puritanical Tolstoy and a disdainful Turgenev. All could've done with a comb and a pair of scissors. There's a rather unhappy looking Tchaikovsky which was a bit sad. There is also a nice portrait of Anton Chekhov dressed in a smart suit and sitting comfortably in a green velvet chair.

The poster girl for the exhibition is Baroness Varvara Ikskul Von Hildenbandt, a socialite and hostess for the arts in her bright red jacket and veiled hat. After a life of privilege and the wife of an ambassador she settled in Paris after the revolution. It's strange to read the short potted histories of the subjects of the portraits and wonder how they survived the hardships they sometimes went through, and that's part of the joy of a portraits exhibition - these people were real. The Baroness fled during the revolution but Anna Akhmatova stayed in Russia and lived through the dangers of the Stalin years. I need to know more about her but I'll leave the Baroness to live on through this portrait.

'Giacometti: Pure Essence' at the National Portrait Gallery

The exhibition of Giacometti portraits at the National Portrait Gallery is only on for another couple of weeks so I popped along to see it while I could. I know nothing about Giacometti other than his name so this was a good opportunity to do some learning. Of course, being at the National Portrait Gallery, then the emphasis was on his portrait works, both on canvas and in statuary and that's a good enough place to start.

The very early works show a love a colour probably influenced by his father who was a post-impressionist painter himself, but when he moved to Paris to study his own style began to emerge. Most of his portraits seem to be of members of his family, particularly his brother and sister and then, in later life, his wife. Again and again, the same sitters , often in broadly the same poses. Giacometti seemed to get frustrated that he couldn't paint what he saw in front of him so he'd try again and then again, refining here and emphasising there, trying again to capture reality. This is possibly why, in some of the portraits the faces are over-worked as he tried to make them real and the body is left almost as an outline - it's the face where the secret to humanity lies and that's what he struggled to capture.

He travelled around and he painted, lived in different places and kept painting and making busts and sculptures. Tiny heads on big bodies in both paintings and busts and, occasionally, a long thin statue, trying to reduce things to a core of being. He became associated with the existentialists in Paris and was courted by Sartre and painted Genet. As his reputation grew it might be reasonable to expect a widening of his palette of subjects but no, he still returned to his brother and his wife as subjects. Almost as if he was still trying to get them right and capture their essences once and for all. I wonder if he ever felt he succeeded?

The exhibition's only on for another couple of weeks so if I've managed to whet your appetite, you know where to go.

Sargent at the National Portrait Gallery

I went back to see the Sargent exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Friday evening to find it pleasantly busy but not overly so. I saw the exhibition of his portraits of friends and artists when it opened so it was nice to go back again and relive some of those paintings. This time I was in a slighty more lyrical mood and wanted to know more about the sitters. Most of which I just made up as I wandered round.

The poster boy is, of course, Dr Pozzi, relaxin at home in his full length scarlet dressing gown. The nadsome man saying, 'Who? me?' with his lace ruffles and carefully combed hair and beard and his hands placed just *so*. His dressing gown is so much redder than in this picture, it leaches the blood out of you to enhance his vitality. I also like the one slipper we see under the dressing gown. O yes, doctor, you know who you are.

Another painting full of back-story is 'La Carmencita', a portrait of a Spanish dancer. Full-sized and hung above head height, her eyes look down on you and you just know she is saying, 'adore me'. What is your function in life other than to adore me? She's noted in the guidebook as being a demanding and restless sitter and you can tell that. She's not going to remain still for long, not in that sparkly frock. She must be thinking that there must be men out there somewhere for her to seduce rather than standing for this portrait and they won't be able to help themselves. I've no doubt she was an expert at slapping too! Adore me, she demands. And I do!

Of course, the exhibition isn't just about portraits, it's also about Sargent's friends, some of whom he went on painting trips with. After a room of dark, formal portraits in the late 1800s there'sa room of light and airy paintings set outdoors and there are some lovely paintings in this room. One of my favourites is 'The Fountain, Villa Torlonia, Frascati, Italy', which is also used on the cover of the catalogue for the exhibition.

It's a marvellous painting and the lady painter's dress and coat just radiate out of the painting - I walked to the far side of the room to see if it had the same effect and it did. The woman (Jane deGlehn) carefully painting something we can't see while her husband Wilfred watches. His languid pose is perfect for this painting since they're on holiday and he's relaxing. The brush strokes are marvellous and the paint mounts up to emphasise the white on white of her coat and skirt as she paints while the garden and fountain does its stuff around her. Her satchell is at her feet and she rests on a stool beside her easel. I'd love to see what she's painting but there's no hint here. I wonder if she got crotchety when the breeze changed and the fountain sprayed across her canvas or whether she thought nature was enhancing her art? I suspect the latter.

Another painting I loved was 'Group With Parasols' which shows a group of Sargent's friends snoozing in the sun in an Alpine meadow. I'm not sure what it is about this painting that attracts me but I love the entangled limbs and careless sleepiness of the four friends. Lazy times indeed.

The exhibition is only on for another couple of weeks so, if you haven't already seen it, make your way across London to glory in these paintings.

'Grayson Perry: Who Are You?' at the National Portrait Gallery

Grayson Perry has an exhibition on at the National Portrait Gallery at the moment, a follow-up to his TV programmes last year about identity and creating portraits of people he met. It's not your usual bung 'em in a room and let people gawp type of exhibition, no, with this one you have to work to find the art.

It's in the first floor of the National Portrait Gallery and at the start of the exhibition you pick up a floor plan with arrows taking you on a journey through the standing collection to find one of Grayson's objects. Will the next one be a vase or a blanket or a statue or a miniature portrait? Find it and find out! It's quite subversive in a way, mixing the old and the new, the usual portraits of the great and the good, mostly dead and named in history books with Grayson's works standing beside them. I wonder how it was decided which work to put in which room?

There are shiny vases, all about two feet tall in different shapes and showing different approaches to family as well as politics and emerging issues. We see gay adopters being celebrated on one side of the vase called 'Modern Family' with images of other family groups on the other side. Another vase is called the 'Idealised Heterosexual Couple' that has the mother and father on one side of the vase and a daughter on the other side but the couple have split up and the dad drives his daughter to dance classes even though he lives a few miles away so that he gets to see her regularly.

Another vase called 'Memory Jar' is about Alzheimers and shows an older couple on one side and the memory thief demon on the other side, stealing memories. Another vase is 'The Huhne Vase' about Chris Huhne, former Cabinet Minister who went to prison for perjury and is decorated with his name, his face, a phallus and balls and other images of what Grayson calls 'Default Man', ie white, middle aged, middle class man.

One of the most rebellious pieces in its own way is 'I Am A Man', a small metal statue based on the Benin images from Africa of a female to male transexual. It's very primitive and raw and very male. And it's placed in a gallery of large paintings of male war heroes. This isn't the best angle to take a photo but it shows the kind of portraits in the room so might help understand the power of finding the right position and site for a piece of art.

There was also a lovely miniature portrait of Rylan Clark as the 'Earl of Essex' in a room full of eminent Victorians, with him being compared to and thought of as modern day royalty. Grayson argues that reality TV stars are the equivalent of royalty these days since they're almost treated as such in everyday life so let's take that approach in the arts.

The largest piece greets you as you climb the stairs to the first floor - an enormous patchwork 'Comfort Blanket'! It notes all the things the British love and love to hate, sometimes in images and other times in words. It's marvellous! And here it is with some people admiring it to give you a sense of scale.

Beside each of the works is a small sign with the name of the piece but also a paragraph or two from Grayson explaining the background to the piece  and this is what he says about 'Comfort Blanket':

The exhibition is free to enter so take advantage of that and visit Grayson. There's lots more than the few I mention - I loved the ceramic fat ladies and would love to have them in my living room to cheer me up after a long day at work. I'm very admirationous of this exhibition and Grayson's works in general. They're fun and frivolous at one level but have something powerful to say if you can be bothered to think. The portrait of him in a madly colourful frock is also on display beside the final works.

Go and see it!