' I think, that if I touched the earth,
It would crumble;
It is so sad and beautiful,
So tremulously like a dream.'



17/10/2012

Richard Dadd: Of Paint and Madness

'nought as nothing it explains / And nothing from nothing nothing gains.' 

William Michael Rossetti once described the painter Richard Dadd as 'the ill-starred painter'. With his story being one of insanity, evil spirits, murder and fairies,  this epithet was certainly well-chosen. 

  
Things, however, did not begin sadly for Dadd: born in 1817, he was a rising star of the art world, admitted into the Royal Academy at only 20, and member of a circle of aspiring young, Victorian painters known as The Clique.

  
Yet, at twenty five, his life took a dramatic turn for the worst when, in the summer of 1842, he accompanied a patron, Sir Thomas Phillips on his Grand Tour of Europe and the Middle East. The pair were having a marvellous trip until their arrival in Egypt, during which time Dadd began to act peculiarly, something which Phillips put down to a case of sun-stroke. However, by the time they had returned to Italy, Dadd had become violent towards his travelling companion and was convinced he was being followed. What's more, in Rome, he had an incredible urge to assassinate the pope during a public appearance.

       On his return to England, Dadd became convinced that he was being plagued by spirits and ancient deities, most prominently that of the Egyptian god of the Underworld, Osiris, with whom he was obsessed and who constantly ordered him about. What was then labelled simply as 'insanity' we know now to most likely have been severe schizophrenia.
   On the night of August 28, 1843, Robert Dadd, the artist's father, accompanied his ailing son on a evening walk in a park in Kent. The next day, the bloody corpse of Robert was found near a pool. Richard had used a razor to clumsily slit his father's throat, stabbed him several times in the chest, then had fled immediately to Calais and onwards to Paris. He was later arrested there after attacking a fellow traveller with his razor, and was brought back to England, where he was incarcerated in London's infamous Bedlam, and spent the rest of his life in insane asylums.
Whilst the picture I have painted is one of a madman, the pictures he painted, especially during his time at Bedlam were, irregardless, extraordinary. Indeed it seems that, for Dadd, painting was a calming release, and his jailers appear to have encouraged it. He not only painted canvases, but was allowed to paint murals on the prison's walls, and even design and decorate sets for its theatre.
The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke (1855-64)
   
   His paintings during this time, though portraying supernatural and arcane scenes, were nevertheless painstakingly and cool-headedly executed. No doubt his most famous work is The Fairy Feller's Master Stroke on which he worked for roughly nine years, and about which he wrote and long and rambling descriptive poem (a line of which graces the heading above). The scene is viewed through long blades of grass and shows a tiny glade filled with all manner of fairy folk who are anxiously waiting for their King to signal a wood-feller at the centre of the piece with his axe held aloft to cleave an acorn in two for the carriage of Queen Mab.

   I was lucky enough to see this painting on display at Tate Liverpool earlier this year, and I can say without hesitation that no photograph you will find can do the original work justice. Each swirling blade of grass obscuring your view, each daisy,  tiny hand and delicate wing is astoundingly detailed and has the most incredible texturing one will ever see. One almost believes one could pick one of the tiny buds in your hand, they are so real. Every inch simply captivates the eye. Unsurprisingly, the piece has gone on to inspire writers like Angela Carter, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, and was even the basis for a song by Queen.
   Dadd's life was dogged by sadness, yet his evocative and beautiful work is a lasting testimony to the man and the artist behind the misery.
For more on Dadd's life and art, see this intriguing article from The Guardian:




09/10/2012

Film Review: Anna Karenina (2012)

A moving and bold adaption that is breath-taking in its theatricality




The respective talents of director Joe wright and screenwriter Tom Stoppard that have united to create this latest adaption of Leo Tolstoy’s classic novel Anna Karenina, deliver a fresh and vibrant addition to the rather stagnant realm of the period drama.
  The film recounts the fall from grace of Anna karenina (Keira Knightley), an aristocratic socialite who defies her husband, government offical (Jude Law) as well as the accepted social norms of 19th century Russia in her scandalous love affair with young, handsome and devilishly charming army officer Count Vronsky (Aaron Johnsnon).
Keira Knightley on set, with the clutter of
backstage at a theatre merging with the lavish
surroundings of 19th century Russian aristocracy.
  To describe this film as visually breath-taking is an understatement.
   The captivating and imaginative concept of setting the majority of the film within the confines of a 19th century  theatre blurs lavish and dream-like scenery with the very real ropes, props and cobwebs of the stage wings. The result is a deliciously stylised portrayal of the decadent final days of the Russian Empire where surge heated passions and scandals, that serves to contrast starkly with the fleeting glimpses we are given of the labouring world of the character Levin, played by Domnhall Gleeson, the film’s ‘one true soul’ according to production designer Sarah Greenwood; he is Wright’s Tolstoy counterpart who is able ‘to leave the theatrical metaphor. He gets a proper house and fields and everything.’ The perfection to detail is at once apparent, from the sumptuous costumes – noticeably Knightley’s, whose garments inspired by 1950s French couture give a subtle dash of modernity to 19th century elegance – to the perfectly choreographed and ethereal dance scenes.
   Despite Johnson coming off as a touch wooden and Keira Knightley’s occasional habit of overacting some scenes, the performances are nevertheless strong, well-played and, combined with the orchestral genius of Dario Marianelli’s superb score, incredibly moving, ensuring Wright’s creation contains a wealth of substance to match its unquestionable style.
   Anna Karenina is a successful interpretation of a notoriously difficult novel to portray on screen, a must see film that explores the boundaries between artifice and reality, happiness and duty, love and lust.
Rating: ★★★★
Runtime: 130 min. In cinemas now.
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