The wind, the rain and the general unpleasantness of today made it an `indoor' day.
Being the weekend we wanted to actually go out and do something, so decided that we would head over to the Tate Modern (just near the London Bridge train station) for a dose of culture and nice wander around.
The Tate Modern itself is pretty spectacular comprising of a huge space reclaimed from an old power station. The mind boggles now at a power station like that being built on the banks of the Thames looking directly across at St. Paul's Cathedral - particularly as it sat empty from 1981 to 2000 when the Tate Modern moved in.
Apart from the building, the space and the location we were pretty underwhelmed at the art. Now neither Ying nor I are experts in art, but I just have to say that this modern art is a bit odd.
It seems to me that these artists are just not part of the fabric of reality - it seems everything is over analysed and just a little too `interpretive'.
Take a look at these examples:
Sticks with Ribbon
What's this one mean - no idea but it looks like the start of a good bonfire.
Greek Nude with Pile of Clothes
Now Ying reckons this is means that your naked body is wonderful and that you don't need clothes. I said it was representative of a material society where it is easier to dispose of your clothes than to wash them.
Either way - it's a naked statue with a pile of clothes - not really art is it?
There were a couple that I liked, this one is definitely my style:
This is pretty big at about 4m wide, the entire thing is painted in dots. I could see that on the lounge room wall no worries.
Then this one was really good - this bloke took photos of himself getting buried in the dirt and you can see in the sequence that he slowly disappears - but what is really great is that with German TV, over 9 days during a prime time TV show they showed one of the photos each day for 2 seconds - no announcements, not information - just a guy slowly sinking into the ground over 9 days. That is quality art in my book.
So it was a fun day out exploring, but I think that we will be happier looking at the art in the British Gallery and places where the art has a bit more realism (is there a comic museum I wonder - that would keep me entertained for awhile).
