Quidam

Watching Quidam at the Royal Albert Hall was undoubtedly one of the highlights of my year, tonight I got to re-live the experience. How lucky am I?

We had already booked for London in January when Quidam’s national tour was announced, but I can’t say I regretted the decision. I just considered myself fortunate to […]

A Thomas Crown Moment

Mr TLC was in no doubt as to how we should start our LOndon weekend. A visit to Tate Modern was definitely required.

So we trundled off to re-visit some personal favourites and encounter something new.

I was intrigued to see how many people still walk along the crack, or carefully step across it, even […]

Quidam

Saturday evening was the big event of the weekend: Cirque du Soleil performing Quidam at the Royal Albert Hall.

I’ve tried to write about their shows before, but I don’t think my powers extend that far, so I’ve found a few snippets for you to watch.

German Wheel

I’m not sure that these grainy videos […]

Double Somersault

I’ve always liked this. It is a large sculpture that stands outside Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

It’s called Double Somersault and is by the artist William Pye. This type of tubular stainless steel structure is fairly typical of his work at that time (nowadays he is better known for his water sculptures).

Double Somersault was erected […]

Beyond Limits – Part 3

The Good News:

Last year, for me, one the highlights of the Beyond Limits exhibition was this piece, Autumn Reflection, by Zadok Ben-David. From a distance it looked like a stylised tree, but on closer inspection we discovered that it was made entirely from small metal figures.

So it was good news to discover […]

Beyond Limits – Part 2

Some more pictures from Beyond Limits at Chatsworth. Two very different pieces from husband and wife François-Xavier and Claude Lalanne.

Pomme de New Yorkby Claude Lalanne

This would look lovely in any light, at any time of year, but there was something very fitting about this giant golden windfall amongst all the autumn leaves.

Le […]

Beyond Limits – Part 1

Beyond Limits is Sotheby’s annual selling exhibition of modern and contemporary sculpture and I’m pleased to see that it seems to have become established as an annual event at Chatsworth.

The selling aspect of the exhibition targets a very select audience. You know the old saying: if you need to ask how much it is, […]

Random Overheard Conversation no 2

Small boy: Are we really looking for love?

His Mother: Yes we are.

Small boy: Where is it?

His Mother: We’ll have to find out.

Small boy: What does it look like? I don’t know what love looks like*. Are we really looking for love?

His Mother: Yes we’re really looking for love.

Much later, […]

Random Overheard Conversation 1

Small girl: What is it?

Mother: It’s called 216.5 degrees.

Small girl: What does that mean?

Mother: Well, a circle has 360 degrees, but this isn’t a whole circle. It’s just part of it.

There is a very long pause. The small girl puts on her best Deep Thought face and considers this information.

[…]

Spiral

I was driving along Queens Road in Sheffield today when these caught my eye, so I decided it was worth stopping for a closer look.

This set of rather nice sculptures stand outside Screwfix. I’ve no idea who made them, or if other branches have something similar, I’ll have to do some detective work […]