Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Open House - Pitzhanger Manor House



A rainy weekend still managed to be part of tour in the lovely Manor house hidden near Ealing Broadway station.Bought by John Soane (Famous Architect and Surveyor) in 1800, with the intention to turn into his dream house- a country villa and later a suitable resisdence for his sons.
http://www.ealing.gov.uk/pmgalleryandhouse
Sir Soane demolished most of exixting manor, apart from an extension designed in 1768 by his first employer, George Dance.He then set about building his own home, which he saw as a "a sort of portrait"- an advertisement for his own architectural style with its striped classical detail, radical colour schemes and inventive use of space and light. 

In 1901 the building was sold to Ealing District Council and extended to become Ealing's Public Library, which now has moved to Ealing Broadway centre. The Manor house has been going through extensive restoration work.In some rooms, original colour schemes have been painstakingly recreated by analising paint samples and there is more underway.I have shared few pics below, wish I could share the amount of knowledge shared on the time of tour by lovely team at the Pitzhanger Manor House. Its increased my interest to visit  Sir John Soane's Museum at 13 Lincoln's Inn Fields.

Below am sharing few pics of the Pitzhanger Manor House, that I took while the guided tour,  unfortunately couldn't take the picture of the Gallery space next door. I would recommend all Design Lovers to visit the exhibition taking place right now 
"The Graphic Design of the Eames Office" 14 sept - 3rd nov, its worth it.

The clashing Interiors on the top floor


Lovely Staircase


The staircase would have been showing off bright red on the floor and Amber colour light from the ceiling covered Amber coloured glass, which unfortunately is not there now. 



Soane's  signature of painting walls wood like or marble like, show off well in the study and breakfast room in the house. I couldn't believe it was not true wood.


The Breakfast room with marble effect on walls and clouds painted over the ceiling,taking inspiration from one of Soane's trip to Europe.

Greek Goddess overlooking the Staricase
The Greek Goddess of creativity stands over looking the staircase, Soane has used loads of leftover materials from his other building sites, for instance the bull heads under the Greek Goddess.








The use of Amber glass can be seen in the above two pics, on the entrance of the Manor house and beautiful glass ceiling in part of the house which is converted into a gallery/Exhibition space.

ceiling in the upstairs room
decorative ceiling in old part of the Manor House


Most of the ceilings in the house represent the clash of periods and inspirations, that the building went through- ranging from soft colours with engravings to paintings in different style.



Old style central heating, I love the pattern of the central heating that is following through the floor in the basement.



AND
Below are the few pics of the area in basement joining the Gallery/Exhibition space to the main house.

love the pattern the lighted glass door forms
like the contrast of the red in simple white



waiting for takers


Sunday, September 23, 2012

Damien Hirst at Tate Modern



Managed to visit Damien Hirst  http://www.damienhirst.com/home   on its last weekend at Tate Modern (8.09.12 ) and oh boy! was it worth it.

It was absolutely intriguing, it varied from parts being distasteful to pure celebration of colours.Lovely sunny weekend with a long queue for the last few booking available for show we were just grateful that we had pre bought the tickets.
Millenium Bridge
Got to see the Infamous Shark created in 1991 now replaced by new specimen since 2006, took some sneaky pictures will get to share these here.I didn't realise or actually didn't even imagine the shark box was an intelligent mix of concave and convex glass so that if you are walking up close, you can feel the shark swimming slowly in the ocean.The display under topic of " The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living" sparks a question alongwith some sort of agreement and disagreement in my own mind.
View from the back - The Shark

The display of the cow and calf cut in half were part of amazing thought process, while thinking why would one do this, I still walked through it.
The walls were covered with Spot paintings on different size canvas and walls; it got more intriguing to see his love for colour through the pans and boxes display. His works of the pharmaceuticals cabinets and lab instruments didn't get much of my attention but the wonderful display of "Four Seasons" created by the colour ful medicine display opened my eyes wide. Such lovely colour schemes and palettes , works wonderfully in glass cabinets, alongwith sneaky reflections in the pictures gives a different dimension.
In another room Manufactured Diamonds cut in pill shape were displayed in the similar routine resulting in the whole room to glitter as a big treasure chest, I think I still preferred being among the colourful displays, well then its just me.
File:Hirst-LSD.jpg
His "spin paintings," created on a spinning circular surface, along with "spot paintings", which are rows of randomly coloured circles created by his assistants, were on display too.

Most of Damien Hirst' work revolve around the topic of Life and Death , the same continues through Big butterfly paintings, Designed to resemble a trio of stained-glass windows from a Gothic cathedral, it almost seems to emit light. Next to it displayed were the Kaliedoscopic effect panitings created Mandala patterns,which were amazing delight for the eyes.Even if somebody wants to say but ooh poor butterflies, am sorry but its almost like a scarp book of a kid in love with the wonderful colours of nature and just wants to play around with it.I just wanted to sit in that room and reflect on life, dont know if it was the magic of the room or the colours or the life n death sequence.
 

 The last but not the least " In and Out of Love " - two room display, with one room filled with bright coloured canvas and butterflies on them arranged in no specfic pattern (according to my mind), with ashtray in middle of the room on a table and then just next to this a room displaying white canvas with cocoons arranged, some of them had manage to live into Butterflies leaving a mark on the canvas but some were yet intact waiting to burst into the new life form.A special room with Moisture control, filled with butterflies flying around was a treat to walk into.One walks softly as if strolling in a butterfly garden suddenly appeared  from nowwhere in midst of this big gallery................................. In and Out of Love certainly.