The good news is that we have a dryer. The bad news, or not so great news, is that it doesn't seem to dry our clothes. I've read the manual and  I know you have to empty the water reservoir and clean the lint screens. Doesn't seem to make a difference. So we have a drying rack in our living room most of the time. But it's certainly something we can live with--as a roommate he's very quiet and doesn't take up too much space. Maybe I'll even name him.

Today I decided to make use of our National Trust membership. I took the tube up to Hampstead and walked the half mile to 2 Willow Road, the Modernist home designed by architect Erno Goldfinger in the late 1930s. The building itself is a block of three homes, and the Goldfingers lived in the middle section. Ursula Goldfinger had been an art student and together they amassed an impressive collection of 20th century art, with pieces by Henry Moore, Max Ernst, Bridget Riley, Eduardo Paolozzi, Prunella Clough, Fernand Leger, and others with whom I was not familiar. The self-guided tour (because I had missed the guided tours for the day) began with an introductory film that was good. There were staff members in each room who could answer questions, so I didn't feel I missed very much by not taking a tour. Goldfinger was Hungarian born, moved to the UK from Paris in the 1930s, and became an important member of the British Modernist architecture movement. He is mostly known for his residential tower blocks (e.g., Trellick Tower).

No photos were allowed, but I did manage to sneak one of the back garden from a top floor window. There used to be a large Henry Moore sculpture in that garden, but I was told it was recently sold to an art museum in Canada (the AGO, perhaps?--she didn't know). And of course I got one of the front.

It was an interesting walk through part of Hampstead. Nice houses, and what looked to be some interesting stores. I had been up here before, but hadn't done much exploring.

I did some grocery shopping after getting off the tube. There were some interesting flavors of potato chips in the UK that we don't get in the US, even though Kettle Foods is an American company. The fact that my only food intake of the day was a small cup of soup probably accounted for my being in the snack food aisle and noticing this, and then buying them.

I must say that the British know how to make good blister plasters. I was able to walk with no discomfort today. Hooray for Compeed!

Miles walked for the day: 2+ miles (not enough to warrant the potato chips)

I think I'm finally getting into the groove. I was spending too much time exploring our new neighborhood and I hadn't visited much else. It didn't feel quite right. So I set off for the Tate Modern. My shoes were good, my feet felt fine. I was ready to visit my old haunts.

With a smile on my face, I crossed the Millenium Bridge, the Tate Modern ahead of me and St. Paul's Cathedral behind. Life was good.

They were in the process of installing Ik-Joong Kang's Floating Dreams. I'll have to get back at night to see it.

In the turbine hall, Doris Salcedo's Shibboleth, the large crack running the length of the massive hall, was gone. You could, however, see where they had patched it.

I had to decide between two ticketed exhibitions because I knew I wouldn't have time for both. I picked Georgia O'Keeffe, a wise choice, it turned out. I have seen several exhibitions of her work and I thought that I'd be able to have a quick look at what I thought would be maybe thirty works and then move on to their permanent collection and other installations. Nope. There were 13 rooms of her artwork, interspersed with the occasional Alfred Stieglitz or Ansel Adams photograph. No photos were allowed so I had to commit my favorites to memory.

The rooms were loosely organized chronologically, geographically and by subject. I learned a little about synaesthesia (the stimulation of one sense by another), and chromethesia (sound to color synaesthesia). I particularly liked some of her quotes that were in the wall text. It gave a little insight into the person she was, her creative process, and her response to her critics. Here are a few examples.

"I paint because color is a significant language to me."

"Men put me down as the best woman painter...I think I'm one of the best painters."

"When people read erotic symbols into my paintings, they're really talking about their own affairs."

"Nobody sees a flower--really--it is so small--we haven't time--and to see takes time...So I said to myself--I'll paint what I see--what the flower is to me, but I'll paint it big and they will be surprised into taking time to look at it--I will make even busy New Yorkers take time to see what I see of flowers...Well--I made you take time to look...and when you took time...you hung all your own associations with flowers on my flower and you write about my flower as if I think and see what you think and see of the flower--and I don't."

"Where I was born and where and how I have lived is unimportant. It is what I have done with where I have been that should be of interest."

I didn't have a favorite room, although I did like room 6, Flowers and Still Lifes, and the Jimson Weed, White Flower No. 1. (Did you know that Jimson weed is hallucinogenic and highly toxic? I learned that 46 years ago.) I was probably least excited about her Kachina paintings. But really, I liked it all. There was a nice little painting of Lake George that I would be happy to live with. And the last room, Late Abstractions and Skyscapes, had some particularly lovely large landscapes.

I could have spent hours in there--wait, I actually did. I mean I could have spent another couple of hours in those rooms with those paintings. But it was time to move on. I went up to the fourth floor and went through the galleries. There are always interesting installations. Like Babel, 2001, by Cildo Meireles, "a tower of radios playing at once, addresses ideas of information overload and failed communication."

Or this untitled piece by Linder. ('Cause, really, what would you call it?)

I then walked across the interior bridge over the turbine hall

to the Switch House section of the building and took the elevator up to the tenth floor viewing level.

I then wandered through the 4th floor galleries of the Switch House where there was a Louise Bourgeois exhibition. This is her Legs 2001.

And you'll never guess what this untitled model of the ancient Algerian City of Ghardaia by Kader Attia is made of.*

*cooked couscous!

This was part of an exhibition on cities, that included two short videos, one of Ai Weiwei talking about Beijing, and the other of Sheela Gowda on Bangalore.

There were so many interesting pieces, but I'll limit it to one or two more. Magdalena Abakanowicz's Embryology, 1978-80 (above) took up a whole room, as did Sheela Gowda's Behold 2009, made up entirely of 2.5 miles of hand-woven human hair and car bumpers.

Remember at the beginning of this entry I mentioned how my feet felt fine? Well by the time I got to the Tate Modern I realized that I was getting a blister, and it got progressively worse as the day wore on. It's strange because I have worn these shoes many times without a problem.

It was time to go, so the other floors would have to wait until my next visit. I walked (limped) over to Borough Market only to discover that it must close at 5 and it was now 5:20. It was interesting to see it deserted.

I also got a few shots of Southwark Cathedral.

As I ascended the escalator from the underground at King's Cross Station I marveled at that invention. We have Jesse Reno and Charles Seeberger in the 1890s and Nathan Ames in 1859 to thank for that. Moving stairs. How awesome is that? It can move hundreds of people in minutes up or down during rush hour. And it wasn't just my painful blister (or blisters, at this point) talking to me.

The older I get the slower I am at things like planning itineraries. Today, I spent hours on our October Spain trip that I had already spent hours on. It doesn't help that some of the websites are not very good and neither is my Spanish. My dabblement (I know, it's not a word, but it should be) with that language started and ended over 45 years ago. I thought I had booked tickets to the Alhambra, but I think I forgot the last step to complete the transaction and it timed out. But it was time to focus on London and the Alhambra will have to wait until tomorrow.

In the midst of booking hotels in Madrid and Sevilla, I also booked tickets for a play for tonight in London. John Osborne's The Entertainer is playing at the Garrick Theatre and this is the last night of previews. It stars Kenneth Branagh in the lead role of Archie Rice, and Sophie McShera (Daisy on Downton Abbey) as his daughter Jean. John Hurt was supposed to play his father Billy Rice, but he had to cancel due to some health issues and he was replaced by Gawn Grainger. Other cast members included Greta Scacchi, Jonah Hauer-King, Phil Dunster, and Crispin Letts.

It's a dark play, set in post-war Britain, about a family of performers. This production describes it as portraying "the seedy glamour of the old music halls for an explosive examination of public masks and private torment." It was first performed in 1957 and Sir Laurence Olivier starred as Archie. I also read that the playwright used the decline of the old music halls as a metaphor for Britain no longer being the world power it once was. I guess I can see that, now that it was pointed out to me. But I found the play just okay. They had a few kinks still to work out but, for the most part, the acting was good. I admit to nodding off a couple of times in the first act, which is a problem I have when the lights are out. So I should probably see it again, but I'm pretty sure I won't.

Before the play, we went to find a restaurant for dinner. Gord spotted a Wagamama very near the theatre. I had been wanting to get to one, since we had really enjoyed going there back in 2007. The food was good and inexpensive back then. This time, not so much. The food was mediocre and a bit pricier. We happened to be sitting where we could watch the food being prepared and I was surprised at the amount of plastic they throw away. For the noodle dishes (and they prepare a lot of them), they pull out a little plastic bag of pre-measured noodles, put the noodles into a larger plastic bag and add the other ingredients (depending on the dish, red onion, bean sprouts, cilantro, peppers, etc.), shake it to mix, empty it onto a hot griddle to cook, and throw away the little bag and the big one. I'm sure it's very efficient, but not very environmentally friendly. I will now have to think twice about going back.

On the way home we took the wrong exit out of the underground at King's Cross and ended up inside the train station. And we found this, which was on my to-do list.

I didn't write an entry for yesterday. I stayed home to rest my feet, finish a book, and work on an upcoming trip--feeling a little guilty that I took a day off.

Today, Gord and I walked two miles to the Jewish Museum to see two exhibitions. Dorothy Bohm: Sixties London was a nice introduction to this photographer's move from studio-based photography to working outdoors. Included here were photographs of a variety of people in different London neighborhoods, going about their day. She captures ordinary lives in such a way that shows more than just a woman entering a store, or children outside a church. By the way, she was born in 1924 and is still going strong.

The other exhibition at the Jewish Museum is Jukebox, Jewkbox! A Century on Shellac and Vinyl. This interactive space on the top floor covers 100 years from the first gramophone to the end of the era, the "sound carriers of popular culture." This history of vinyl is also a history of Jewish inventors, musicians, composers, music producers and songwriters. There were hanging record sleeves divided into sections: Cantors, Popular Songs, Yiddish Theatre Songs, Comedians, Educational, Musical and Film, Folk Music, Israeli Folk Music, Klezmer, Arabic-Jewish Music, Black and White, Pop Music, Israeli Pop Music, Punk, and Jewish Radical. There was a long display table with headphones all the way along it on both sides, and you could listen to songs from each of these categories. I listened to some Beastie Boys, some Israeli Folk Music, and a cantor.

On the next level down was an exhibition giving a history of Jewish people in Britain from the earliest known settlers in medieval times to the Jewish community today. It was very well done with a lot of interactive areas, drawers to open and items inside to discover, taped stories to be heard. They also had clothing for children to try on, except that all of it was out for cleaning. There was a separate gallery dedicated to Leon Greenman OBE, a holocaust survivor who spent the rest of his life campaigning against racism. He was 97 when he died in 2008.

And lastly there was a gallery showcasing their collection of Jewish ceremonial art, one of the world's finest.

From there, we caught a bus to the Ben Uri Gallery and Museum to see Unseen: London, Paris, New York, 1930s-60s, featuring the photographs of Dorothy Bohm (this time in Paris in the 50s), Wolfgang Suschitzky (in London in the 30s), and Neil Libbert (in New York in the 60s). The title Unseen refers to these photographers documenting their initial impressions of their first time in these respective cities.

We passed by Abbey Road Studios on our way to the St. John's Wood tube station, but I've already taken that iconic photo so I will spare you.  I did take this photo for my sister Carole, to assure her that I am taking her advice.

We met John (the other Skidmore faculty member here this semester), Christina, and their children at a nearby Indian restaurant for dinner. We had a nice visit, even after a waiter spilled a pint of beer in my lap.

Miles walked today: about 4

I set off this morning for the Parasol unit foundation for contemporary art (their lowercase, not mine). I walked part of the canal towpath until I got to the Islington tunnel and then I had to go on the regular streets. I was on the Jubilee Greenway, judging from the occasional sidewalk marking. (I later Googled it and found out that it is a pathway of 37 miles that linked the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics venues.)

I was in new territory, east of where we are living. I found a little outdoor market, a large Sainsbury's grocery store, a Marks & Spencer (where I purchased a coffee and a scone), and a couple of nice-looking restaurants (a Spanish tapas bar with a man slicing up the ham in the front window, and a Vietnamese pho restaurant). I ended up heading north on Islington High Street at one point but I eventually found my way.


The Parasol unit foundation was established in 2004 and is "internationally recognised for its forward thinking and challenging exhibition programme." This summer's exhibition is The Space Between, showcasing the work of Bangladeshi-British artist Rana Begum. The artist says that she "draws inspiration both from the city environment and her own childhood memories of the geometric patterns of traditional Islamic art and architecture." Her pieces play with light, color and form, and how they work together. She works with paint and different types of steel and aluminum (aluminium). Most of the pieces are three-dimensional and, with the way she uses color, some of the pieces are really three pieces in one, depending on where you stand--so movement is also important to her.

No. 480, 2013 viewed from the left

No. 480, 2013 viewed from the right

No. 480, 2013 viewed straight on

Part of the canal in their back patio area

Now I don't pretend to know anything at all about contemporary art, but I'm trying to learn. I certainly cannot decipher on my own what is going on in a piece of abstract art so I like to have someone explain a piece to me. (That's why I like taking a docent tour at places like MassMOCA or dia: Beacon.)  Fortunately, there was a handout and a very good video interview with the artist by the foundation's founder and director Ziba Ardalan. So maybe I still don't understand it completely but I liked it, and that's good enough for me.

Next door was another contemporary art gallery, Victoria Miro, but it was closed for the summer holidays. I'll try to get back. Instead I walked north to another museum, The Estorick Collection. Eric Estorick was an American collector of 20th century Italian art, especially Futurist art. Unfortunately, I arrived there to discover that they are closed for renovations from August 2016 to January 2017. Oh well, I can't see everything.

I walked back over to Islington High Street. What a happening place. I found a lot more interesting restaurants, and my niece Brea will be happy to hear that I stopped in to Ottolenghi and picked up a couple of unusual salads and some trout to take home for dinner (our flat is still too hot to cook in).

I walked by (and partly through) Joseph  Grimaldi Park. I didn't see his grave nor did I see any clowns. (Grimaldi was a famous clown in the late 18th century and apparently his grave is a place of pilgrimage for clowns today.)

Favorite sign of the day:

(I looked it up when I got home to find out that it is a type of paint with a thick, oily finish that is slippery and prevents people from climbing on things like fences. It is also called non-drying paint or anti-intruder paint.)

Total miles walked today: at least 4.25 (6.84 km)

Another scorcher. At least in our flat. Outside was not as hot. We must figure out a way to keep it cooler inside because I'm afraid it will be hot inside even when at some point it's only 70 outside. All of the windows are south facing so it is full sun beating in most of the day. Consequently we keep all of the curtains closed, which makes it dark.

Gord went to the airport to meet the students. I stayed in and read until the afternoon. After topping up my data plan on my phone and going to the post office, I had planned a short walking tour. But I stopped in at the shopping concourse at St. Pancras station and got a little side-tracked. I bought a variety of salads for dinner at Marks & Spencer and then headed north out of the station. I got a bit lost trying to find a certain street and then the neighborhood seemed a little sketchy, so I decided to head back. But then I got more lost and almost ended up in Camden Town. Thankfully I had data back on my phone and was able to find my way back to streets that I recognized. I had wanted to stop at the Camley Street Natural Park, a two-acre wildlife refuge between railway tracks and Regent's canal. I passed the entrance, but I was worried about my salads out in the heat so I didn't go in. It's less than ten minutes from our flat and I'll go another day.

I stopped at the King's Cross Theatre box office and bought tickets for The Tempest next month. I'm excited to see this production by the Donmar Warehouse because we had seen their production of Henry IV in Brooklyn at St. Ann's Warehouse and it was great. It is an all-female cast, including Harriet Walter.

So, not a very exciting day. Tomorrow is supposed to be slightly cooler.

It is hot here in London. I don't want to complain because I know that soon I will be taking my umbrella out with me each day and wearing layers. But our flat has no a/c and it is hot. The high was over 32 C today (or almost 90 degrees Fahrenheit). Our flat is still hot and it's 11:40 PM.

I went to the London Canal Museum, which is a half block from our flat. It was hot there as well. The museum covers the history of the canal system in England as well as the ice trade (because the building was an ice warehouse built in the 1860s).

The museum is very child-focused and there were many children running around having a good time. They had a narrowboat you could board and there was a recording giving you an idea of what it was like to live and work on the canal. Unfortunately the recording was difficult to hear over the sounds of the happy kids.

Regent's Canal is 8.6 miles long, extending from Paddington to Limehouse, and it was built in sections. It has 12 locks and 3 tunnels. This year and month mark 200 years of the opening of the first section of the canal, and there was a special exhibition about it.  I learned that until World War II most barges on the canal were pulled by horses.

There are guided tunnel boat trips that go through the Islington tunnel, the longest in the south of England. It is about 3/4 mile long. I may sign up for it another day. There are also walking tours along the towpath, which I may do as well.

The museum had a large well in the middle (and another hidden one) that was used to store the ice that was originally brought from Norway on boats and barges. On display were tools used in moving the ice, some iceboxes, and information about entrepreneur Carlo Gatti, who established an ice importing business among other ventures and who was famous for his ice cream.

We went to a nice dinner at Caravan in Granary Square with Brea and Marty. The food was very good, the company even better, but it was hot in there, too. I learned from Marty, among other things, about Branston pickle and I will have to try it. It is made from a variety of diced vegetables (carrot, onion, cauliflower, turnip), with tomato, vinegar, apple and spices. I wonder which is more loved here, Branston pickle or Marmite. I'll have to take a survey. And I wonder, for those of us not raised on either, which would we prefer. I'm not sure I want to buy Marmite, but for the purposes of my study I really ought to.

It's now 12:45 AM and still hot.

No photos today. I was going to use a photo of a Branston pickle jar that I found online, but I was warned by a pop-up message that that wouldn't be a good idea.

We set out to walk the city walls of York, but it is a little tricky because they are not contiguous, i.e., large parts are missing. After all, they were built in the fourteenth century. The circumference is 2.5 miles, except that the signage directing you between gaps is non-existent. We did a good portion and then at the first break in the wall we had to climb down, at which point we got hopelessly lost. Our map was not very good, either, and when we got our bearings again we had to backtrack. It would have been closer to 3.5 miles if we had done the whole circle. But we wanted to visit the York Art Gallery, too. We probably walked at least two miles anyway. We saw nice views of the Minster, part of the old Roman wall, some swans, and the shortest street in York, Whip-Ma-Whop-Ma-Gate. The plaque said that in 1505 it was known as "Whitnourwhatnourgate (and meaning 'what a street!'). It was changed later into its present name. The footpath was paved in York stone by York Civic Trust in 1984."

The York Art Gallery was a finalist for the Art Fund's Museum of the Year award (losing out to the Victoria and Albert). They are known for their extensive collection of British pottery ad twentieth century British painters.

Like every museum in Britain in 2016, it seems, they had an exhibition on World War I art, Truth and Memory: British Art of the First World War. This one, however, was organized by the Imperial War Museums and was first shown at the IWM London. It is the largest in 97 years, more than 60 pieces, and it was very powerful. The Royal Academy of Art in London had an exhibition of 925 pieces of war art in 1919. One room of that exhibition, Gallery III, was replicated here. The pieces in this room were massive.

Travoys Arriving with Wounded at Dressing-Station at Smol, Macedonia,September 1916 (1919), by Stanley Spencer

View from the Old British Trenches, Looking towards La Boisselle, Courcelette on the Left, Martinpulch on the Right (1917) by William Orpen

The Mad Woman of Doual (1916) by William Orpen

Interior of the Pavilion, Brighton,: Indian Army Wounded (1917), by Charles Burleigh

The Return to the Front: Victoria Railway Station (1918), by Richard Jack

The "L" Press. Forging the Jacket of an 18-inch Gun: Armstrong-Whitworth Works, Openshaw, 1918 (1918), by Anna Airy

Women's Canteen at Phoenix Works, Bradford (1916) by Flora Lion

Their other art was great, too.

Clifford's Tower, York, 1952-3, by L.S. Lowry

Winter Sea, 1925-1937, by Paul Nash

To reinforce my observation in yesterday's blog that Brits know how to make museums fun for children (and adults), this museum had a desk with drawers of things and a sign that said, "HANDS ON. Use the objects in the desk drawers and cupboards to create your own Vanitas still life. You can draw your still life in one of the sketchbooks too if you like."

And there were statues that you were encouraged to touch.

And you could superimpose your face onto a computer image of a painting!

I promised myself I wouldn't go overboard with the photos, yet I've done it again. And I haven't even talked about the pottery yet.

Part of the Anthony Shaw collection was on display. Shaw, who lives in northern London, collected over 1,000 works, largely contemporary ceramics, which are now on loan to the museum. The exhibition was designed to resemble the interior of his home.

Remade Horse Figurine by Kerry Jameson

Another gallery space was The Lumber Room: Unimagined Treasures (from a short story by Saki), which had a lot of fun pieces.

Landscape collages by Mark Hearld, who curated the show

Scrapbooks by Mark Hearld

I bought a book in the museum shop, 50 British Artists You Should Know, by Lucinda Hawksley. I knew many of them, some I learned about on this trip, and some I still need to discover. Looking forward to it.

After leaving the museum, we walked through the lovely Museum Gardens, collected our luggage from our hotel, and caught our train back to London.

Observation of the day: There were two guys on the train who were quite loud and who were drinking the whole of the two+ hours. As I passed their seats on our way off, I counted 15 empty beer cans on their table. I know Americans have a reputation for being loud, but you can find loud people in every country, especially if drinking is involved.