jane brocket

tiffany's of manchester

[Any Wintry Afternoon in England (1930) CR Nevinson]

I was wandering round Manchester Art Gallery yesterday wondering why I felt so reassured to be there. It brought back memories of my visits as a teenager when I went to look at 'my' paintings, to make sure they were still there, to rediscover a few constants in turbulent teenage times. Once again, I found I could look at Work for ages and still find something new, I could float in Albert Moore's pale, lush colour studies, and I could almost smell the burning leaves in Millais' painting. It's like finding old friends; you pick up where you left off and they don't seem to have changed. 

[The Schoolroom (c1937) Vanessa Bell, lithograph still available]

All the while, I was searching in my mind for the quote that explained the security I always feel in this gallery, and today I've just looked it up. It is of course from Breakfast at Tiffany's when Holly Golightly explains how she copes with the 'mean reds' and the only thing that does any good is to jump in a cab and go to Tiffany's: 'The quietness and the proud look of it; nothing very bad could happen to you there'. This is how I feel about Manchester Art Gallery: nothing very bad can happen in there and in fact, like Tiffany's, it's such a grand, solid building  and holds so many beautiful things, I'd like to be more able to get a taxi to it in times of need.

[The Eiderdown (1928) Sydney Carline]

It was always free to get in, full of Manchester industrial pride and money, and with a famous collection of over-heated Pre-Raphaelite paintings which appeal to teenagers and a lesser-known but tremendous collection from other eras and genres. Now it also has one of the few modern extensions which I like a great deal and think works perfectly, and thus huge amounts of exhibition space.

[The Picnic (1924) Mary Adshead, painted to look like a tapestry]

These two assets - space and collection - come together in the current exhibition which has brought out all sorts of paintings I've never seen before. It's large but focussed and although there may not be many masterpieces in there, it's packed with famous names and gives a clear and comprehensive overview of the period. It's a simple theme done well. It doesn't cost a penny to see - and you really can see it as there are never too many people in there at any one time. Plus, there is a transcendentally lovely painting by Winifred Nicholson on display, and nothing bad ever comes of looking at her paintings.

repository

[punts, a couple of weeks ago in Cambridge]

This blog has proved to be a useful distraction and source of consolation in recent weeks and months when terribly difficult things have been happening. It's a little repository of good things, small highlights, and positive moments. These are by no means representative of my days, but I put them here to remind myself that they still exist. The thing is that life goes on, that it's counterproductive and not good to be completely submerged by sadness and despondency (that way madness lies etc). Better to acknowledge the bad parts, know that good times will return, and endeavour to keep a balance. 

[famous for its buns]

So I collect beautiful, simple patterns in punts on the Cam, nicely proportioned, plain Georgian windows contrasting with a 1920s 'handwritten' sign,

[Botanic Garden]

and pure white magnolia against a pure blue sky. 

[Magdalene College]

I put in tulips planted to match rubbish bins (I sincerely hope this was the case and that it's not just a happy coincidence...),

[church opposite Kettle's Yard]

plus little hidden gems of Englishness.

I store all this and more in my repository of miscellaneous goodness.

[detail of 'Youth' by Kathleen Scott outside the Scott Polar Research Institute. Great biography of KS.]

And really, really, really hope that it will be warm enough to go without socks soon.

i get around some more

[photo by Phoebe]

Stockport this time.  200 miles there, 200 miles back, seven hours in the car, two tired eyes because I was on my own. I feel I'm getting to know more about the the service stations along the M40 and M6 motorways than I ever really wished to know. Still, the lilac is out, there were two incredible, huge rainbows on the way home where there was white wine in the fridge, and the stylish baker had baked for me.

i get around

[The Grand]

We had to drive to Scarborough and back yesterday. 560 miles, 1o hours in the car, goodness knows how many inches of rain on the motorway, four very tired eyes. We had only an hour to spare in the town but managed to look inside at the incredible public rooms of the once-grand Grand which needs quite a few million pounds to restore it to its former glory (even then I think it's not what people want now), see one of the funiculars (now boarded up), admire the view of the bay, harbour, castle which is still something like the poster below minus the glamour, the tie, the Brylcreemed hair, the wide-brimmed sun hat, the warmth, notice the north's colourful answer to Brighton's bow fronted terraces on Falsgrave Road, catch a glimpse of the 1845 station, and exclaim from the car at the 1936 Odeon cinema, now a theatre.

But the highlight was the entrance to a holiday home park on the A64 between Scarborough and York, where the corner of the busy road is filled with tall, strong tulips of all varieties and the scheme is so far removed from the usual red-and-yellow public planting that  I had to stop to look at and enjoy the glorious mix of shapes and vibrant colours.

It's the work of the nearby Daisy Garden Centre; never mind the Chelsea Flower Show, this deserves a medal.

Just down the road is the old Castle Howard station, now a holiday home which would be a great place to stay if you have longer than an hour to spare.

And yes, Sunday's tulips were indeed 'bonny and blithe and good and gay'.

[great Beach Boys 'I Get Around' footage here]

working hard for a living

Tulips give their all. So much so that there's not much chance of a repeat performance.

Carrying on with sport, I've noticed that the sub editors on the Guardian's sports pages (printed version) are working hard for their living - or maybe it's just one particular sub - by creating some wonderfully rhythmic headlines. This week's highlights have been 'Sunderland make light of Gardner's red card with show of slickness and spirit', and my favourite so far which uses iambic pentameter: 'Wiggins wobbles among curves and cobbles as Battaglin strikes blow for the minnows'. Hats off to him/her/them; I've been reading the sports pages for a long time as they often contain quite brilliant prose, metaphor, psychology and philosophy, and now I can include poetry.

friday's tulips

Should be loving and giving, but even I don't go that far with tulip anthropomorphism. 

To amuse myself on Wednesday morning I put together a Manchester United red-and-white bunch, something that turned out to be very apt when later that day Alex Ferguson resigned. I grew up with Man Utd and Bobby Charlton and Nobby Stiles and George Best all playing the classic red and white strip. My brothers supported Manchester City and my Mum supported United (but was still able to acknowledge Man City's generosity towards Man Utd after the war when they let them share their ground, Maine Road, because Old Trafford had suffered bomb damage). I've never been bothered about football, but growing up just outside Manchester you couldn't avoid it. My interest extended only to what the players wore, and I also liked the West Ham colours and the bright orange-yellow of Wolverhampton Wanderers. But nothing could or can beat the simple, striking combination of bright red and pure Persil white on a pitch.

Or in a vase. (The photo taken today shows just how mad some tulips go once they have been picked.)

far to go

[Thursday's tulips]

I could pick them when they are green, anonymous and tightly furled, but instead I pick tulips when the flowers have started to fatten up, develop colour, and when I can see which variety they are. I pick in the morning when they are still closed and fresh and full of energy. 

They've already come a long way. From Holland to home, bulb to flower, autumn to spring, hidden to visible, so I aim to catch them just as they have far to go in terms of colour and drama, glory and gorgeousness.

full of woe

Wednesday's tulips, shortly before they go on the compost heap.

On a brighter note, I've just enjoyed Bedsit Disco Queen by Tracey Thorn. Everything But The Girl formed the soundtrack to our IVF treatment. When I was making the ten or so daily 110-mile round trips to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, I used to play Take Me loudly on the M40 and sing deep meaning into the opening words. Incredibly, I got the three babies.

tuesday's tulips

...are full of grace.

(Monday's were appropriately fair of face.)

memorial

While we were out yesterday, I told Simon about the Liverpool Cenotaph. It is the most unusual and affecting cenotaph I have ever seen because it not only memorialises the dead, it also depicts the other side of the story by representing the mourners left behind.

It stands on the St George's plateau just below the vast, neo-classical St George's Hall which is all Greek and Roman influence, repetition of tall columns, friezes and steps, a monument to reason, enlightenement, and justice. Instead of being tall and thin, this cenotaph is shaped like a huge bier, a solid but simple elongated rectangle which fits perfectly with the building behind.

But it's the bronze reliefs on either side which make it so moving. On one side are the soldiers and sailors in various hats and uniforms, marching of to war in perfect formation, all looking as straight and as rigid as the neo-classical columns behind them, all facing the same direction which is, inevitably, death. You can't help thinking that they look like automata, dehumanised by the terrible conflict.

So what is wonderful is that on the other side of the monument is an equally huge relief which shows those left behind: the mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, the old and the young, laying wreaths in a remembrance ceremony, with stiff rows of graves in the background. Unlike the soldiers their heads are bowed, their shoulders are stooped, the men are hatless, the women are weary but defiant, and the children look innocent.

It was unveiled in 1930 and it's utterly of that time; it crystallises a response to something everyone must have thought would never happen again. The late 1920s clothes, hats, shoes and hair styles are frozen in bronze, and make it quite clear that no-one thought for a moment that they woud be having to add the dates of the Second World War to one end of the monument.

I can't think of another cenotaph which shows both the dead and the mourners, and it seems to me that this facing up to reality and not glossing over the horror is typical of Liverpool and Liverpudlians. Until Simon asked me, I hadn't considered which relief was on which side. In fact, the soldiers face the Hall, the voice of authority, the call to arms, the expectation that duty will be done. The mourners, the civilians, face the throngs of ordinary people who exit the great Liverpool Street Station every day. It's an orientation which undermines the establishment, and elevates ordinary people. It chimes perfectly with the spirit of the city, and with the speech which Bill Kenwright made at the recent Hillsborough memorial service in which he said that the two greatest words in the English language were "my mum".

When we got home we had a telephone call to say that Simon's brother had died. He'd suffered a long and at times harrowing illness; he wasn't young but nor was he old. The mourners on the beautiful Liverpool cenotaph remind us clearly and simply that 'in the midst of life we are in death'.