We don’t have time for the whole museum, but the monument itself is in our reach. It’s a genuinely quite impressive piece of architecture and memorial, and surprisingly low-key for the Americans. When we visited, the fountains were off due to maintenance, but this had no massive impact on the effect.
10:30 - 11:20
So happy to be able to watch it, we came back again for more. Front row seats the moment the museum opened. Delighted to be there for a turn-of-the-hour moment, and delighted that the kept the whole of the Bad Santa alarm clock scene.
I’m a sucker for the MoMA design store, and it’s practically a museum in its own right. A fantastic collection of obscure and artistic products, with an inevitable range of Teenage Engineering synths and a whole host of kitchenware that we would absolutely kit the kitchen out with if we had either the money for the objects themselves or even the cost of importing them all.
You try keeping Alasdair away from an exhibition with a title like that. It’s not not for me, but I can’t pretend textiles are my favourite medium. I am quite enamoured by the pieces where the original sketches/designs are paired with them, and dare I say it I find the latter more interesting.
15:55 - 16:35
I was so delighted to turn up to the MoMA and find this was being exhibited. So much so that we even came back the next day to watch more. I absolutely love The Clock. It is a masterpiece. It is hypnotic and compelling and an absolute exemplar of the core medium of film, the juxtaposition of discrete images to imply causation and connection. You watch these intercut clips, knowing they are unrelated, and still start trying to unconsciously thread together a narrative; actors reoccur at different ages. The thrill of seeing a film you recognise (In The Mood For Love ) turn up. I could watch this all day.
Our first museum trip of the holiday, we head straight to the top floor for the MoMA’s retrospective on Jack Whitten. A well-staged exhibition in which I find a lot to like whilst some of it does leave me cold. The more cosmic works, taking abstract pieces, tiling them, and reassembling them in different configurations really worked for me, especially seeing how that evolved over time and remained relevant even through to an iOS influence. Other pieces do less for me, but it’s well organised and Alasdair takes to it a lot more, so time well spent.
Hrmm. I do enjoy this, for the most part. I think there are a lot of interesting ideas in there, the use of dangling microphones and FX pedals adding effectively annotations to the text, the half-singing/chanting nature of Brie Larson’s delivery, the rotating stage design. I don’t, though, think it necessarily exceeds the sum of its parts, nor are those ideas necessarily well linked to what the play is trying to say. Not well versed in the play, at times I am just having to vibe out whatever’s happening and hope it will all make sense in the end. It’s a staging that is trying very hard to hit you on a gut level, and it does manage that in a way. Brie Larson is excellent, as is Stockard Channing, duh. I can imagine that, were this a two act play, the audience return rate would be interesting to watch. I think, in the end, I enjoyed it as an experience, but not quite as a play.
We managed to get through most of the Bristol Light Festival installations this year, and we managed to do so together, which is a change on last year. I’ve broken out my Sprocket Rocket camera for the first time (and have yet to get them developed, so we await with baited breath) but do also take some photos on my phone. There are a lot more music-based ones this year, which is fun, but are also more enclosed, which means I am forced to reckon with the general public’s unerring sense of selfish lack of self-awareness. Alas. The creatures outside St Mary Redcliffe are fun, as is the squidgy black hole creator in Broadmead. It’s all good fun, and you get some photos out of it. I don’t think it’s ever really much more than that, though.
An idea from a pub conversation that has got massively out of fan. Stupidly fun. I forgot how intense Adam Riches’ eye contact is. Enjoyed how much John Kearns enjoyed Alasdair enjoying a line about the agricultural revolution. Spent the whole show very conscious that Ed Gamble and Rosie Jones were in my eye line on the other side of the stage.