Annie Leibovitz at the NPG

Today I went to see an exhibition on Annie Leibovitz' at the National Portrait Gallery and it was so good. These late images, all taken after 1990 are stunning and there was this really great collage bit at the end sort of like a timeline at the same time of all her work.
Her photos of Johnny Cash and his family in Virginia, Johnny Depp and Kate Moss in bed and Leonardo di Caprio with a swan around his neck were amongst my favourites. But I also really liked the small but vivid images ob subjects taken from deep within her personal life, which challenged issues of death and life-threatening illness of those close to her.
Afterwards I bought the exhibition book 'Annie Leibovitz: At Work' which I'm super looking forward to reading.
The NPG's website does it better justice than me though-
http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/annieleibovitz/index.htm

Egon Schiele

Today my lecture on the Austrian Secession and German Expressionism reminded me of how great Egon Schiele is.

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European Art 1000-1400 lecture

Today I had a lecture about "The Heavenly Jerusalem" and how all Medieval churches and cathedrals were created in order to emulate this city, which was supposed to be the Heaven that awaited all believers after the Apolcalypse. It is described in Revelation 21 as "brilliant, like a jewel" and Medieval architects and masons sought to represent this heaven, on earth, in their creations.

This reminded me of a cathedral I visited in Krakow over the holidays, St. Mary's Basilica (or the Mariacki, built 14th C) which is th best response to this belief that I've ever studied, let alone seen. Its beautiful and sparkling inside.

(photos: Wikipedia)

Juergen Teller

Juergen Teller is the bomb.


Although born in Germany, he is based in England and began his career by capturing images of celebrities like Elton John and Nirvana. He soon became involved in fashion photography, for which he is best known, and shot for i-D and the Face. You might recognise his work from the Marc Jacobs advertising campaigns.

This article on him from the Times online is quite entertaining:
'Juergen Teller: the exhibitionist'
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article3886349.ece

His work has appeared in many exhibitions in Britain, for example the recent Street and Studio at the Tate Modern which was really great, and if you like him I recommend his book Do You Know What I Mean? where a grotty, pink-haired Kate Moss gins at you from upside-down on the cover.

"Most fashion photography is done by gay people finding women sexy,” Teller says, “which is sort of not sexy at all, at least to a heterosexual man. She’s so retouched, so airbrushed, without any human response at all, and, well, you don’t really want to fuck a doll.”

-Juergen Teller in New York magazine

Nocturne: Blue and Gold

Old Battersea Bridge c. 1872-5

James Abbott McNeill Whistler:

"When the evening mist clothes the riverside with poetry… tall chimneys become campanili and the warehouses are palaces in the night and the whole city hangs in the heavens and fairy land is before us."