Art for Art's Sake - Part 3

Amanda loves the sea, and feels wistful if she stays away for too long.  We have friends who adore the wilds of Northumberland, and others who feel drawn to travel far and wide to foreign climes. Me - I love London, and many of the reasons are encapsulated in this composite picture taken from Room 1113 this morning:

Ironically, Westminster Bridge can't be seen, but I still think Wordsworth said it best, over two hundred years ago:

Earth has not anything to show more fair: 

Dull would he be of soul who could pass by 

A sight so touching in its majesty: 

This City now doth, like a garment, wear 

The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, 

Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie 

Open unto the fields, and to the sky; 

All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. 

Never did sun more beautifully steep 

In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill; 

Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! 

The river glideth at his own sweet will: 

Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; 

And all that mighty heart is lying still! 

Of course, in addition to the romance of every street, building and monument telling a thousand different stories, reaching back hundreds of years, there are still elements that appeal to the little boy in me.  Back in 1959, another holiday outing involved a river trip to the Tower of London. There, surrounded by 900 years of history, was I drawn to the cannon, the armour, the Beefeaters, the Crown Jewels? No. I was drawn to watch carefully as builders hoisted a wheelbarrow out of the moat with a block and tackle, while my Dad, my Aunt Peggy and sister Mary looked on:

Plus ça change.  As I zoomed in on various parts of the cityscape I noticed that, just below the skyscraper known variously as "20 Fenchurch Street" or "The Walkie-Talkie", men were moving around on a roof. Ten minutes later I was still watching as two of them were strapped into a cradle and swung over the side of the building...

Enough of such distractions. Once again we had pictures to see. Once more we breakfasted at Pret a Manger on Piccadilly, where this time our attention was concentrated on the modest corner shop next to Hatchards - Fortnum and Mason.  In particular, we could not believe that we had never before noticed the Lynn Chadwick figures above the door - until a Google search confirmed that they were a relatively new addition.

Breakfast completed, we headed out. The day before, Amanda had noticed Maison Assouline just across the road.  Their website claimed that "Assouline is the premier brand on luxury, offering a wide variety of books and more. Browse through books on art, travel and fashion for the best reads". It sounded just the place for a couple of bibliophilic retired gentlefolk to while away 45 minutes before heading off to our next exhibition. We lasted perhaps 75 seconds before realising that Maison Assouline was far more interested in being a bar than a serious bookshop, that the only tomes on sale were from their own catalogue, and that these were both over-priced and overweight.

We made our escape and, as is our wont when in that part of London, strolled through Burlington Arcade, wherein the schoolboy within me is forever tempted to whistle, just because I know that it is not allowed.

Having had my fill of gazing longingly through windows at £600 shawl-collar cashmere cardigans reduced to £400, we made our way to the Royal Academy, where we had tickets for admission at 11.15 to see the America after the Fall: Painting in the 1930s exhibition.

This lived up to expectations, and the famous American Gothic was as striking as it was intriguing.  The exhibition had opened for the first time only a couple of hours earlier, and the galleries were more crowded than I would have liked; there were also a couple of times when my "pseudo-intellectual bullshit" detector threatened to go off-scale as one gallery visitor tried to out-do another in their artistic one-upmanship but, these niggles aside, I would happily go again and am pleased to recommend it.

Out into the RA courtyard, where we observed a couple of (unidentified) big-wigs being chauffeured up to the front door.

With two or three hours to kill before our train departed we strolled back through Piccadilly Circus and Charing Cross Road.  On to Cranbourn Street to yet another Pret a Manger, where we sat and watched the crowds go by while we ate (and I noticed that the newsagent across the road was called Cranbourne News and wondered who was responsible for the errant 'e').

Out onto Cranbourn Street and we nabbed a quick picture of the memorial to Agatha Christie.  Not the best photo, but I was struggling not to capture the two tourists who had decided that this was the perfect place to dump their bags, smoke their fags and make their calls while leaning against the monument.

Back to Trafalgar Square and then along Pall Mall, from where we wended our way back to St James, pausing for a quick drink and a rest in The Chequers Tavern almost adjacent to the hotel. Bags collected, we accepted the bell-boy's offer to hail us a cab, which whisked us to Euston (train services via St Pancras being replaced by buses on some stretches of the route) where we caught the train and thence arrived home without incident, exhausted but happy.