Spoonfed needs therapy...art therapy.
Spoonfed is always one step ahead, bringing you interviews and reviews and up-to-date news of all the greatest things going on in London. We are the humble servants, the brave knights, the highwaymen stealing through the treacherous forests of London, bringing back the gold, the diamonds of information. Or so we like to think anyway... So as we lay our capes down, take off the anonymous masks and the stresses and strains of life move in upon us, anxiety begins to loom. Yes, Spoonfed needs therapy – a welcome break, a little detox.
Symptoms
Let us consult Cyril Connolly's insightful observations in this 1944 book 'The Unquiet Grave' – why? Well because Spoonfed's eyes are open to all literary works, eager, searching and hyper-aware of predicaments that you and I might face – maybe we should start a problem page? And of course Cyril knows best. According to Cyril the temporary cures for angst are gossip, literary talk, the office joker, old friends and...art. This fella says that it's in art that you can find true timelessness, your escape from life.
If art's the way forward then we need the best chance of a cure, we need a place with enough paintings to get us through, enough great artists to pick us up, enough masterpieces to make us emerge glorious and ready to carry on with the mission. So the National Gallery is where we dare to tread.
Unfortunately the Londoner is all too well accustomed to this occurrence – coming to escape yet remaining faced with tourists, kids, people in the way and the generally uninterested. How we must search within the masses to find Cyril's timeless medicine and not concern ourselves with thinking of the best way to drop-kick people out the way.
Cure?
It's in these paintings that we seek the suitable dosage, with a little painted violence thrown in to keep the outward aggression passive:
The Supper at Emmaus, Caravaggio, 1601
Room 32
The truly breathtaking, mesmerising, almost hypnotising detail is captured wonderfully. View close up to notice that even the skin on the chicken has you staring in amazement.
An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, Joseph Wright 'of Derby', 1768
Room 34
The magnificent dull light emphasises the features of the contrasting emotions, the scared girls barely able to look, the interested men and a guy that looks like Doc from Back to the Future drawing you in to watch his cruel bird killing experiment.
The Execution of Lady Jane Grey, Paul Delaroche, 1833
Room 41
Blindfolded and ready to face her death as her ladies in waiting look on barely able to contain their grief, the tension rises. Lady Jane's life is coming to an end at any moment, played out there before you on that stage.
The Execution of Maximilian, Edouard Manet, 1867-8
Room 43
It's in the face of the solider on the right preparing his gun nonchalantly whilst the others prepare to shoot that you see the horror of the situation.
Interior, Vilhelm Hammershoi, 1899
Room 46
Turned away from us, the lady in the painting could be expressing any emotion; it's up to you which one you feel her posture expresses.
After Effects
Not exactly a distraction from life but the National Gallery makes you dive head first into the chaos of London. Find no escape but seek timelessness in the painted faces of others, the adamant expression of paintings from eras that remain unfamiliar and surprisingly in the equally mesmerised faces of the other mere mortals around you. Aggression contained suitably, weariness evaporating, temporary cure taking effect.
Go and find out if you discover timelessness in art, become surprised at what you never even imagined is on your doorstep. And if that doesn't work then blame Cyril, not us!
Images from the National Gallery collection.
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