Perfect Poise, Perfect Life
Bring your body into balance and revolutionise your life
By Noel Kingsley
Publisher Hodder Mobius
AVAILABLE HERE
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A face to a name
Isn't it lovely when we can put a face to a name? You may have known of someone for quite some time, but in the absence of personal contact or a picture, our own imagination will come up with a mental image that could be a million miles away from reality. Well I came face-to-face at the weekend with quite a number of names I'd known of for many years and it was a very interesting experience.
On a weekend when the weather didn't do what it was supposed to, but being Bank Holiday weekend in England it was true to form and rained constantly. So with my senses alerted to all the lovely spring fragrances as I blogged on Friday, we got a noseful of the most wonderful post-storm scent of clean, invogorating air. There is nothing quite like the air after a storm that's so crisp you can cut it with a knife. You get it in mountains or beside waterfalls, but we had it in London...and it's as refreshing as.......the air after a thunderstorm. Wonderful!
Filippino Lippi
Being rather 'grounded', we took ourselves off to the Dulwich Picture Gallery in south London to view a collection of 50 self-portraits of artists on loan from the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. The Uffizi has collected self-portraits from artists for around 400 years since Cardinal Leopoldo de' Medici (1617-1675) started the practice of collecting painted images by the artists' own hands. It is now the largest and most famous collection of artists' self-portraits in the world amounting to about 1,630 images. It is housed in a one kilometre-long gallery Corridoio Vasariano connecting Palazzo Vecchio to Palazzo Pitti passing through the Uffizi and above the Ponte Vecchio in Florence.
So here in Dulwich we have fifty of them, spanning 400 years, from Filippino Lippi, son of Fra Filippo Lippi (1457-1504) who I knew of from my school art studying days, Jacopo Tintoretto (1518-1594), Velazquez (1599-1660), Joshua Reynolds 1723-1792) Ferdinando Cavalleri (1794-1865) through to Marc Chagall (1887-1985) to name just a few.
Wandering from one to the next and recogizing some names, many are new to me and we think about their character, what were their loves, what was personality like. Some are proud and almost aloof, some appear shy or reclusive and others cheerful and outgoing. In all cases, each artist has been invited by the Uffizi to present a portrait and there is no artist in the world today who would not consider it a privilege to bestow the gift of his or her self-portrait to the Uffizi.
Francesco Hayez
One that really captured my eye is a painter I had not heard of, but who was famous in Venice for his portraits of high society and historical subjects. Francesco Hayez (1791-1881) looks out from the dark canvas where the space around him allows his image space to breathe with quiet dignity and gracious elagance. He looks you in the eye, but there is modesty and humility, a quiet gentle calmness, yet he stands with stature. The card beside this painting says...'On 31 March 1863 the artist wrote to Andrea Maffei - thanks to whom Hayez finally decided to present his own portrait to the Uffizi "Here, my dear friend, is the box containing my portrait, which you graciously offered to present to the Director of the Gallery of Florence". Hayez apologized for the delay in sending the painting because of his uncertainty regarding the quality of the work for such a prestigious destination with 'so many outstanding works by worthy artists'. This painting to my eyes, was one of the most beautiful there, exquisitely painted, so gentle so strong, so humble, modest and quiet, yet he was uncertain of the quality of his work.... I liked him.
On leaving the gallery, you are invited to sit down at one of a dozen small tables and with the aid of a hand mirror, crayons or pencils, draw your own likeness on a postcard and put it on the wall. There were already a great number adorning the walls. I looked at my own likeness that I had fashioned clumsily with my inexperienced hands. It would be not too bad for a six year old....maybe a seven year old. I wondered if I should sign it.....'Oh dear' I thought, my efforts were rather worrying; the Uffizi would be unlikely to accept this. The experience of trying-one's-hand was a good reminder of the skill so evident in all the images we had just seen; the lifetime's experience, the constant work, coping with the ups and downs of their career as painters, not giving up when the going got tough or they felt they 'couldn't do it', but eventually achieving, with a hefty dose of talent and genius, the skill and mastery to be amongst the best portrait artists the world has ever seen.
I came away having learnt a lot, and particularly not to give up on something just because I find it difficult. I returned home to practice vibrato on my violin.
