The Blue Lotus issue Four

Racconti muti - Silent Tales by Alessio Schiavo

Alessio Schiavo was born in Gallarate, Italy, in 1965. He studied at Milan Polytechnic where he graduated in architecture, in 1990. He began his professional career in 1992, working mainly on residential architecture and interior design, and has participated in numerous architectural and design competitions. Since 2001 he is also an Adjunct Professor at the faculty of Architecture at Milan Polytechnic. Schiavo combines constant painting research with his architecture practice, and has won national awards for painting, both on solo shows and in group exhibitions. Schiavo has exhibited alongside the Chinese artist Luo Qi, both in Italy and in China.

The latest, diminutive (15x21 cm), artworks titled "Racconti muti - Silent Tales”, by northern Italian architect and painter Alessio Schiavo, have grown out of a collaboration for a book of illustrated poems.

Though still inspired by Mark Rothko’s unique brand of Abstract Expressionism, Schiavo brings a gentle “Italianess” to his own works, an almost ethereal gentility to images romanticized from antiquity. The reduction to their present size lends these thirty pieces an ephemeral quality, a fragility conducive to the poems they stand against.

 Schiavo has added a fresh element and melded it into the abstractions. Echoing the writer’s text, but not text itself, Schiavo renders a hand drawn 'text’ that is sans text as an echo of the poet’s words. Those cursive strokes recall the “Pseuoscripts” known as “Pseudo-Kufic”, “Kufesque” or occasionally Mongol (Phags-pa) script writing. They resemble cursive text, but represent no known language. Such imitative cursive imagery pre-dates even the southern Italian faux Arabic coins from the 10th century (those from Amalfi, and Salerno). Those fake coins (called tarì) used illegible pseudo-Kufic script instead of genuine Arabic, and were no doubt caste by artisans unfamiliar with Arabic language.

More importantly though, this form of “Pseuoscript” manifests itself in European paintings from the 10th century onwards (in France, Greece and Germany), but the most important discovery is “Pseuoscript”, arabesque lettering used as ornament in Italian painting of the 13th century onward. It is used as ornament by artists such as Cimabue (Cenni di Pepo,1240-1302) using false Arabic on a mandril (handkerchief) held by a crying Virgin Mary, in his painting “Crucifix” (1265-1268). Then there was Giotto (Giotto di Bondone, 1267-1337)), painter and architect from Florence. Masaccio (1401-1428) who used this form of cursive writing for halos in the “Madonna and Child Enthroned with Angels” (1426), and not forgetting the pseudo-Arabic halos by Gentile da Fabriano (1370-1427), in the slightly earlier paintings such as “Adoration of the Magi” (1423).

Schiavo’s thirty pieces are not of silver. There is no suggestion of a betrayal of his art, but they are silent. As mentioned above, the artist incorporates pseudo-script, faux-language, into these thirty pieces, rendering them silent. The ‘language’ is false, unreadable, and therefore to all intents and purposes are “muti"  or “muto" (dumb) but not “Senza Voce”, having no voice, nor voiceless nor “taciturno” (tactiturn). The voice is the combination of pseudo-script and image, it speaks but with the language of art not of text. The abstraction, image making, and the manifestation of the illegible language sits as a counterpoint to the very legible poetry it co-exists with. Separated from the poetry Schiavo’s thirty pieces take on a substance, a voice, and importance of their own, they phenomenologically become.




See more in the next issue of The Blue Lotus magazine, out September 1st 2016

Dali and Duran

  Over a number of years I have been able to return to Hotel Durán in Figueres, Catalunya (Catalonia), Spain. I have been amazed and honoured to be taken along for a Dalí ride, meeting the Durán family and new friends in Figueres. The circle grows ever wider with thanks to the late Señor Lluis Durán Simon, his ceaseless forging acquaintances, and his allowing me to follow in his adventurous Catalan footsteps.

For a while I was able to visit annually, but it has now been a while since I talked about Señor Durán’s father (Lluis Durán Camps) and the relationship that he had built with Salvador Dalí, the fact that they went to the same school but were not in the same class. Señor Lluis Durán Simon would tell of extracurricular chance meetings; when Dalí’s father would bring his son into Hotel Durán to eat. One shy boy (Dalí) looking at another shy boy (Lluis Durán Camps). Señor Durán would tell of the times when Dalí was grown, eagerly eating the Catalan fare created by the foremost Catalan chefs at Hotel Durán, he would also tell of the performances that Dalí would give in the hotel restaurant and the special menus they created. 

With over a century of service, Hotel Durán continues to be at the forefront of hotel restaurants within the region. Hotel Durán continues to be highlighted in travel guides like ‘Pyrenees’ by Marc Dubin, where it is mentioned as three-star, and “top standard”(page 142). Señor Ramon Durán Juanola, had always set aside his busy schedule and journeyed with me through his recollections of Salvador Dalí, as seen through his youthful eyes, growing in the knowledge that his grandfather, father and, later, he too were able to be a part of Salvador Dalí and Gala’s lives, and their connection to Hotel Durán.

Figueres, the capital of l’Alt Empordà, remains a most important city within Catalunya. It had already began to grow with the building of Castell de Sant Ferran (Sant Ferran castle), in the late 1700s. That castle is rumoured to have held 6,000 men and, in the stables, 500 horses in its heyday. Castell de Sant Ferran is also renown as the last Republican bastion in Catalunya, after the fall of Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War (1936 to 1939). The Civil War in which British poet Laurie Lee, British writer George Orwell, American writer Ernest Hemingway and Mexican muralist David Alfaro Siqueriros had fought alongside international brigades trying to stem the tide of fascism sweeping across Europe. It was a war in which Dalí’s good friend, the poet Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca (Federico García Lorca), had been executed.

The now much acclaimed Hotel Durán and Restaurant (in Figueres), itself once also a bastion against fascism, has been frequented by many international celebrities including, of course, Salvador Dalí and his wife Gala. The hotel, however, had very humble beginnings as a travellers rest-stop in the mid 1800s. 

I sat with the present owner, Señor Ramon Durán Juanola, one of the local gastronomy group calling themselves La Cuina del Vent (Cooking the Wind), in the now famous El Celler de Ca la Teta, a remnant from that original rest-stop, Ca la Teta (place of sisters). It was in that antique cellar that Salvador Dalí had entertained friends, saving them the torturous trip over the roller coaster ride on that road across the Pyrenees, to his home in Port Lligat. Dali, Gala and hosts of friends were catered to by Señor Lluis Durán Camps, Ramon’s grandfather.

The original travellers’ rest stop (Ca la Teta), was founded in 1855, in Career Vilafant, by two sisters, during a period known as Catalunya’s Renaixenca (Renaissance). It was seven years after Spain’s first railway (1848) had begun and twenty-two years before Figueres had its first railway station (1877). Ca la Teta, was one of the meeting places, rest-stops, and postal stops catering to travellers in and out of Figueres. Ca la Teta specialised in travellers into Catalunya’s interior, to places like Besalú and on to Banyoles, which was then a four hour journey away from Figueres. 

With the covering of the old disease-ridden river bed forming La Rambla, its open space and promenade, in 1864, the town began expansion. Joan Durán Hugas rented the small building previously known as Ca la Teta, calling it Fonda (the Inn) Durán and, in brackets, Antiga “Ca la Teta” (formerly House of the Aunties). As was traditional, the husband provided transport to other places while the wife organised food for busy travellers, thus began the Durán legend in Figueres. 

With the advent of La Rambla and the small roads feeding it, the entrance to Fonda Durán was changed from Carrer Vilafant to where it is today, on Carrer Lasauca, absorbing with it the old Hotel Commerce. Later, in the 1930s, the property became known as Casa de Menjars (eating house) under the guidance of Señor Lluis Durán Camps. Hotel Durán grew with the growth of Figueres. To date, Hotel Durán has had many famous guests, including Maurice Chevalier and the Catalan writer Josph Pla, but none had been more constant, nor more connected to Hotel Durán than Salvador Dalí.

Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech (Salvador Dalí) was born in Figueres,  May 11th, 1904, and named after his father Salvador Dalí i Cusí, a lawyer, and also after his late brother. The family lived on the 1st floor of number 20 (now number 6), Carrer Monturiol. In the Summer of 1912, the family moved to the top floor of Carrer Monturiol 24 (now number 10). Dalí’s older brother (Salvador Galo Anselmo Dalí Domènech) had been born on October 12th 1901 and died in 1903, nine months prior to Dalí’s birth. Dalí’s mother was Felipa Domènech I Ferrés. She died in 1921, aged 47. In 1963 Dalí had painted ‘Portrait of My Dead Brother’ (now in the permanent collection of The Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida, USA).

There is a school photograph titled ‘Figueres, Calle del Palau’ (Palace street), where a band of children, boys with hats, girls in their button-down dresses, pose. They are the alumni from 1914-1915 and 1915-1916, of the Figueres drawing school, Collegi dels Maristes (Marist Brothers College). The group from 1916 includes a twelve year old Salvador Dalí, and it is the same year that the young Dalí painted the oil and card ‘Landscape’. The gaggle of children pose somewhat impatiently for the cameraman, Jose Masdevall - whose Imprenta Libreria (literally printing library, or photo gallery) stands in the background of the image. By the age of thirteen Dalí was attending Figueres Institute High School. And, in 1917, the young Dalí began with Professor Juan Núñez Fernández, in the Municipal School of Drawing, Figueres. In the Summer of 1918 Dalí exhibited his paintings for the first time, in the lobby of the Municipal Theatre in Figueres and then again in 1919.

He was 15.

Dalí and his parents visited Hotel Durán numerous times as the boy grew. In his manhood, freshly arrived from his sojourn in American (1940 - 1948), Dalí would continue his connection to Figueres and Hotel Durán. On his return to Europe, Dalí was to paint another in his ‘elephant series’, ‘Los Elefantes’, the first being ‘Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening’, 1944.

“Each time he went to Figueres Dalí would visit my grandfather, for lunch, or have parties. My grandfather would prepare all that he (Dalí) needed” mentioned Ramon Durán Juanola. Hotel Durán had connections in France. Since the days of Spain’s Civil War, when the Figueres Durán family were split, with half the family studying gastronomy at the french border, and the other half keeping the Figueres hotel running, connections had been made in France. Since his years in Paris, Salvador Dalí had adored French culture. In Spain, at that time, only Hotel Durán could access French food, especially dairy products, French literature and magazines. It was to Hotel Durán that Dalí went to keep up with news and culture from France. Dalí also contacted Lluis Durán Camps for his kind assistance with his performances and asked various favours. Once Dalí found himself in need of feathers. Duck or goose feathers, “feathers were needed, feathers from cushions of Hotel Durán’s rooms”, observes Ramon Durán Juanola. Arturo Caminada, Dalí’s driver, was sent to obtain the feathers from Lluis Durán Camps and to transport the hotel cushions to Port Lligat for the making of a film. 

Throughout his adult life Dalí was only able to rely on very few people. Arturo Caminada who had stayed with Dalí for 37 years was one, also Joan Vehí, who was with Dalí for 35 years and Lluis Durán Camps who had known Dalí since their schooldays together in Figueres. 

There are many anecdotes portraying the closeness of Dalí to Hotel Durán, but one in particular demonstrates Lluis Durán Camps’ visionary abilities. Seated in Hotel Durán’s El Celler de Ca la Teta, I sat with Ramon Durán Juanola as he explained “My grandfather (Lluis Durán Camps) had recognised Dalí as a painter who had an international reputation. My grandfather had approached the Mayor (of Figueres) to have an exposition of Dalí’s works, and talked with Dalí’s secretary Captain (John Peter) Moore, to help Hotel Durán with an exposition of paintings or drawings, something in the town in which he (Dalí) was born. 

It was a small idea.” he said “The idea came from this table” remarked Ramon, taping the wooden table in El Celler de Ca la Teta, where we were sitting. “At this table were the Mayor of Figueres, Ramon Guardiola, my grandfather and Captain Moore, talking about what they can do, in this city, to celebrate Dalí.” he went on “Both Dalí and Gala had wanted to do something in Spain, maybe in Barcelona or in Madrid, but had not considered Figueres.” There were many ideas suggested but, once the idea had taken hold, Dalí had become fixated with doing something grand in the city in which he was born. So began the idea of creating what became known as the Dalí Theatre-Museum germinated.

Over the years Hotel Durán had created many menus centred around Dalí’s love for Catalan and American food. Here is a selection……

A menu, dated August 12th, 1961

Gazpacho cortijero (cold tomato soup) 

Llomillo amb mongetes (beans with pork) 

Llagosta i Pollastre estil de Port Lligat (chicken styled lobster from Port Lligat) 

Boifaara dolca de L’ Empordà (sweet Empordà sausage) 

Flaones de Sant Pau (sweet pastries filled with cream) 

Vinos y champaña Perelada (wines from Peralada, and champagne)

followed by coffee and liquors.

Another Hotel Durán menu (September 22nd, 1967) de Delhi a Dali (Dehi to Dali), celebrating Dalí’s collaboration with Air India, who had just given Dalí a live baby elephant (Surus), features…..

El Melon con Jamon De Massanet de Cabrenys (melon with ham, a rural speciality)

Los Pescados y Mariscos de Port Lligat (fish and seafood from Port Lligat)

El Cordero de can Xicu a L’ast Rovellones de Pirineo (Mushrooms Pyrenees style)

La Montanyeta en Llamas (flaming pastis)

las Fruas Sopresa (fruit surprise)

Champagne Perelada

Cognacs and Spirits 

Coffee

A van took the elephant to Dalí’s home in Port Lligat, where it was let loose in the gardens. Over night, the baby elephant ate as many of Dalí’s flowers and bushes as it could find. In 1971, Surus had outgrown his welcome and was placed in a zoo, in Barcelona, while awaiting a more permanent place in Valencia.

In the November of 1970, Hotel Durán hosted a dinner in honour of Gala and Salvador Dalí. It was on the occasion of the initiation of works for the Dali Museum in Figueres. the menu ran…

Sopa de Ajo con Huevo Gratinada (Rosado Ampurdán) 

(Garlic Soup with Egg Gratin, with Pink local wine)

Lubina Flambeada al Hinojo (Blanco Perelada Pescador)

(Flambé sea bass with fennel, with White local wine)

Chuleta de Ternera del Ampurdán a la Antigua (Champan Perelada)

(Calf cutlet with local champagne)

Turban Helado de Frambuesa

(Raspberry Ice Cream Turban)

Pastel Ampurdanes

(local cake)

Bomba Sorpresa

(bomb surprise)

Café Coñacs Licores.

(coffee, cognac and liquors)

Señor Lluis Durán Simon, the former owner of Hotel Durán (and Ramon’s father), remarks that the Dalís enjoyed “…soup slices of dry bread, garlic, a little olive oil, a sprig of thyme or mint, perhaps adding broth and a whole raw egg, well beaten, at the end. They particularly enjoyed the Spanish cold soup gazpacho or a simple consommé. Gala usually began her meal with a consommé containing sherry, she preferred it very cold, even if it had lumps.”

Dalí and Gala liked the head and leg of veal, or pig ‘s trotters boiled in a casserole, served with boiled potatoes and pesto. They ate paella, prawns and fresh Crayfish (but only the tails), mullet, sole, sea bass, sea bream, octopus, squid, sea ​​urchins, mussels and local Catalunyan anchovies. Otherwise they might partake in lamb chops, or grilled beef filet with artichokes, eggplants or chips and, when in season, forest mushrooms like rovellones or rosinyols. Dalí and Gala ate traditional Catalan dishes such as roasted thrushes (also popular in rural Naples), plain omelette or dry sausage with beans.

For dessert it could be the “Butifarra dolça of L’Emporda”, sausages pricked to prevent bursting during cooking, then place in a saucepan with a finger of water, a glass of muscatel, the rind of a lemon, sugar and cinnamon. They are cooked on low heat so that the sausages cooked slowly and become sugar coated. When cooked they were placed on bread slices and served hot. It is a traditional dish which Dalí loved, and Hotel Durán often shares this with its guests.

At Hotel Durán, Dalí often partook of the local Peralada Castle wine. Castell de Peralada, where the wine is made, is approximately 11 kilometres from Figueres, and was Dalí’s favourite vinery. For the Dalís one or two glasses was enough. The area had a reputation enhanced by Carmelite monks who tended vineyards in the 14th century. In the 20th century it was Miquel Mateu, who acquired Peralada Castle in 1923, that brought back the prestige of Castell Peralada wines so beloved by Dalí. However, sometimes Dalí might prefer to drink garnatcha from the drinking vessel known as the porrón, though he was also known to pretend to (with his thumb over the pouring spout).

After Gala’s death (in June 1982) Dalí retreated both from the world and from Hotel Durán. He died in Figueres where he was born, 1989, aged 84. His memory lingers in photographs and prints on Hotel Durán’s walls. His spirit encourages gastronomic delights such as the annual Tastets surrealists. Dalí’s bronze bust greets visitors as they enter Hotel Durán the street. Hotel Durán is not all about Salvador Dalí, its own gastronomic star shines very brightly, but there remains a long link between the Dalís and the Duráns which, inevitably, will always be there.

Since I originally wrote this piece Señor Lluis Durán Simon has joined Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech and Gala Dali in the Catalunya beyond. He is sorely missed.

Visiting Vehí (Dalí's photographer)

Señor Joan Vehí Serinyana (otherwise known as Joan Vehí) and I

It had been three years since Señor Lluís Duran, Figueres hotelier and bon amic, had driven me over the Pyrenees to the Alt Empordà comarca seaside town of Cadaqués (2013). It was there that we had first met Salvador Dali’s carpenter and photographer, Joan Vehí Serinyana (otherwise known as Joan Vehí). On this occasion (2016), it was Catalan writer Azucena Moya who drove, helped us with translating and conversationally kept our minds occupied and away from the sharp bends and sheer drops of the steep Pyrenees mountain range. Sparkling Azucena had previously assisted before, and we were very happy to have such an able, knowledgable, person with us. She had helped translate in with my Art Talk in Figueres (2015).

Over many years Cadaqués has hosted a number of famous people. These include Pablo Picasso (also a friend of the Pitxot family), Antoni Pitxot (friend, collaborator and co-designer of Salvador Dali’s museum in Figueres) and Marcel Duchamp, who first discovered the town in 1933, and returned for the Summers from 1958 to 1968. Man Ray, René Magritte, Federico García Lorca and of course Salvador Dalí, all visited or stayed on in Cadaqués. As a youth Dalí stayed at the Pitxot house, and learned painting from Ramón Pichot (Pitxot) his mentor, and who was, coincidentally, friends with Pablo Picasso in Paris. Dalí had also met the love of his life, Gala (Elena Ivanovna Diakonova, then Gala Eluard, wife of Paul Eluard) when he was staying in Cadaqués in 1929. In 1930 Dalí began building his home in Port Lligat, just along the coast from Cadaqués. He lived and painted there for 40 years, until Gala’s death in 1982.

Joan Vehí was born in Cadaqués, Catalonia, Spain, on 30th May in the year that Dalí met Gala, 1929. It was also the year of the Barcelona International Exposition, the second Worlds Fair to be held in Barcelona, the first being 1888. At the tender age of fourteen Vehí, took the initiative to become a carpenter. Manuel Torrents was Vehí’s first teacher, teaching with manual tools. In 1947 Vehí learned to operate machines, and later, established the first factory wood machines in Cadaqués. Working with wood enabled Vehí to mix with the artists visiting Cadaqués, including Salvador Dalí.

Señor Lluís Duran, an old acquaintance of Señor Vehí, had arranged for Azucena and I to visit with him for an informal interview, as part of my background research. Once more we traversed the steep, pebbly, white and blue, vermillion and pink bougainvillea clad corridors, down and up to that old carpentry workshop that Señor Vehí, a cabinetmaker and carpenter by profession, had converted into a small museum dedicated to his photography (1996). We remembered that it was adjacent to the stunningly white Església de Santa Maria (Saint Mary’s Church), in Cadaqués.

To read the interview go to Issuu, The Blue Lotus issue 4, available 1st of September 2016

A Visit to L'Escala

left to right..Lluis Duran, Lluis Roura and Martin Bradley

My host, friend, and mentor in everything Catalonia, hotelier Señor Lluis Duran, was most insistent that I visit with his bon amic, an artist and yet another Lluís, Lluís Roura Juanola. I was in Figueres for a short break from seeing exhibitions in Lombardy, Italy. I had a tight schedule which began and ended with catching up with Spanish friends, eating copious amounts of tapes (Catalan Tapas) and spending time with my extended family, the Durans. Eventually, after much persuasive persistence on Señor Duran’s behalf, I surrendered, letting him drive me in his ageing Audi through Catalonia’s charming Province of Girona to the antique fishing town of L'Escala.

It has been written that L’Escala, a municipality of Alt Empordà, in Girona, is acknowledged for two things, the ancient (Greco-Roman) ruins known as Empúries, and as a small fishing town producing the salty small fish we call anchovies and Catalans call seitons (which some say are simply the best and mentioned by Francisco Zamora in his "Diary of journeys in Catalonia”, 1700s). To this, admittedly short, list I add a third - Lluís Roura Juanola, or Lluís Roura as he prefers. It is said that Catalan artist Lluís Roura Juanola came into this world on a rainy day, at dusk, on the 5th of December, 1943. He arrived in San Miguel de Campmajor, in the province of Girona, Spain. Roura’s birth was premature, complicated. In that dire situation one Dr. Verdaguer took water and baptised the child, believing as he did so that the new born had not long to live. Roura, however, survived.

Señor Duran drove me past the early Summer countryside, past petrol stations also selling wine,  past the turnoff to Roses and the roundabout where Roura’s mosaic (executed by Armand Olive in 2001) stands, along near the coastal waters of L’Escala (the scale), around and up to Roura’s magnificent multi-tired house overlooking the bay. In front of that traditionally white-painted house, in the Spanish tradition, stood an antique olive tree, still bearing fruit. Being elevated, and being by the bay, a welcome breeze cooled us as the sun was beginning its slide towards the horizon. As it did Roura, a keen photographer, whisked out his camera and began to take photographs of us, not to forget the brush of the sun’s dying rays across the scant clouds and calm waters. I turned, startled to see a stork perched on the roof, gazing too at the sun setting. Roura gave a chuckle. The bird was transfixed not by the sunset, but by its fixtures to the roof. It was a very real statuette. Many, it seems, had been caught by Roura’s little jest, including me.

Since his first art block drawings, back in the very different Spain of 1958, Roura has, over the decades, dedicated himself to the Catalan environment which has nurtured him for so many years. As a boy, taking the very first artistic steps into what was to become his amazing career, in 1960 Roura had won second prize in his first art competition then, later, in the same year, a first prize in another. Through the decades he has gone on to win awards, and amazing accolades for work which has brought him to the fore of Catalonian artists, and honoured by the town in which he now lives. Roura’s paintings have always had the sense of ‘giving back’, enriching the region which has become a constant subject for many of his larger scale works. L'Alt Empordà inspired Roura to paint and have published a weighty tome of his paintings about that region, including El pas de la tramuntana (1987) which captures the sombreness of the wind which can cause madness, and Geologia Cap de Creus (1986) echoing both Salvador Dali, whose home was nearby, and his friend Antoni Pixot, both of whom had been inspired by that most especial Catalan nature reserve.

Roura engaged his visitors with an honestly smiling personality which projected his joie de vivre and good naturedness. His greatness has come through his painting the immediate environment, and later his photography. As we traversed the various layers of his seaside home, travelling towards his voluminous penthouse studio, we were led through his art gallery where huge, joyous, paintings acted like windows into colourful worlds. Worlds drenched by Mediterranean sun, warm, practically exotic or picturesquely static, frozen, frostily white but nevertheless dreamy Catalonian landscapes like Tapissat de neu, Tapis (2006) or La nevada La Vajol (2006) awaited our gaze. One impressive landscape caught my eye (La Tardor - Autumn, one of The Four Season series, 1987). It was a stunningly fiery landscape in autumnal colours.  A furious dance of reds swirled to their own gypsy tune with vermillion, red-orange, hot yellows drifting back to calmer pink shades dotted with practically staid green trees edging the eye to the horizon. Blue/grey with swathes of yellow swept into the practically placid sky. It was a flamenco tour-de-force worthy of Turner’s Sunset Over a Lake (1840).

We stepped up and into Lluís Roura’s studio. Dominating the room was a most impressive picture window looking out to the town, revealing the extremely scenic Bay of Roses, and its setting sun. Artistic paraphernalia were strewn across Roura’s stupendously large atelier penthouse. It was obvious that that generosity of space also doubled as an office as desks and a computer shared the space with easels, tripods and tables laden with paint-filled palettes, brushes and paint tubes in various stages of use and, of course, paintings. One easel mounted, ready primed, blank canvas and all the references the artist requires for that new work stood awaiting the artists hand.

As if by prior arrangement, the outside sun began to grace the sky with gold. Roura grabbed another camera and dashed outside, encouraging us to do the same. He has taken thousands of photographs from his rooftop terrace, capturing myriad sunrises and sunsets and everything in-between. Looking at the spectacular celestial display one could understand why. Colour changes were so rapid that the human eye could barely catch them, but a camera lens can.

Lluís Roura’s expansive painting of the Holy Land, titled The Landscape of Jesus’s Baptism, executed between 2010 and 2011, resides in the chapel of the baptistery Sant Pere de Figueres, in Figueres town, near the Dali Museum.

Amorous Delight; Amarushataka (The Sutra Dance Company Performance)

I had tickets for the final night (of the four night spree) of Ramli Ibrahim’s dance presentation, Amorous Delight; Amarushataka, by his Sutra Dance Company, at Damansara Performing Arts Centre (DPaC).

Ramli and I had first met a few weeks previously, at Sutra House, during a gathering of the Malaysian Art Institute alumni. I thought him charming. A vision in his South Asian clothing, and a good advert for an energetic life. I had long been an admirer of his performances, his zest for life and his unwavering dedication to dance, and all that that entails. I was delighted to finally meet him, though briefly, for a talk amidst the noise and furore of the art school’s celebration, which Ramli had hosted. Later, I was invited to attend his latest production and performance, Amorous Delight, hence the tickets. It had tried to rain, but nothing was going to spoil that enchanted evening.


Before the show, in the foyer, was a small exhibition of intriguing works by Odisha artist/designer Jyoti Ranjan Swain which were also centred around the spirit of love. Those mixed media images, in their delicate ink and gouache/colour on Mill-Waste sheets, were an unexpected, yet delicious, primer to the anticipated show. 

The Sutra Dance Theatre dance performance of Amorous Delight gave homage to five verses (1, 4, 8, 40 and 74) from a collection of 100 Indian Sanskrit quatrains titled Amarushataka, by the 7th c. Indian poet Amaru. Some of the later palm leaf manuscripts (podi) were illustrated by an anonymous Master of Sharanakula (19th Century, Orissa, India). Dr Dinanath Pathy, along with Eberhard Fischer, had recently written on that very subject, for ARTIBUS ASIAE, publishers at Museum Rietburg, Zurich. Dr Pathy, resplendently elegant, was present at that night’s performance. A selection of illustrations taken from that 19th Century manuscript were projected as a backdrop to that DPaC Amorous Delight performance of the Orissa (Indian) dance known as Odissi.

There are many classical Indian dances. The oldest text of Nāṭya Śāstra of Bharata Muni (sanskrit) represents a detailed stagecraft manual, elucidating and observing how various dance styles; Bharatnatyam, Kathak, Kathakali, Kuchipudi, Manipuri, and Mohiniyattam etc should look and be performed. The Nāṭya Śāstra suggests that there is “no axiom, no concept in the universe that cannot be expressed by the body”, so spake Ramil Ibrahim in a recent ‘Ted Talk. The Nāṭya Śāstra introduced the theory of ‘bhava' and ‘rasa’, vital to Indian aesthetics. ‘Bhava' meaning an emotional state or mood portrayed by the dancer/actor, while ‘Rasa’ “taste” or “essence”, referring to the sentiment that ‘bhava' has manifested by the actor, and therefore evoked within the audience. In the Nāṭya Śāstra ‘Odhra Magadha’ is mentioned, and may be identified as the earliest precursor of the present day Odissi dance style so beloved of the the Sutra Dance Company.

In the theater we heard, but could not see, the players of music. Ordinarily an Odissi orchestra might consist of a ‘pakhawaj’ (drum) player, a singer, a flutist, a sitar or violin player and a manjira (hand cymbals) player. Dancers are adorned in Odiya silver jewellery and an especial coiffeur. along with voluminous Sambalpuri (Western Orissa style) or Bomkai saris (from the Odisha village of the same name). They are often vibrant in colour and unique to the dance style.

The Amarushataka collection of semi-erotic poems deal with “delights and deprivations” of love, and the “dark anguish of union-separation”, according to one reviewer for The Tribune (2006), and tell of "the young beloved of slender body and bewitching face" with "enchantingly dishevelled tresses, the vermilion on the forehead smudged", "tiny beads of sweat shining as the earrings swing in playful rhythm”. The poems are intimate, loving, with a touch of the poet Rumi (Jalal ad-Din Mohammad Balkhi) echoing sweet forlornness in longing.

With the aid of superbly lyrical classical Indian music from Srinivas Satpathy, Guru Dhaneshwar Swain and Ramarao Patra, Sivarajah Natarajan’s evocative lighting triggered the imagination to set the scene for a powerfully memorable performance. Ramli and company were, of course, simply stunning in their performances. From the large bow-drawing gestures, to the minuscule kohl lined eye movements and quasi-erotic kinesics, the performers intrigued and delighted a most enthusiastic audience. We watched enthralled as one performer indicated that her glances and her smiles would adorn the doorway, waiting for her lover, her breasts glinting with anticipatory perspiration replacing water pots. It was bosom heaving, love lorn poetics, skilfully transposed into stunning dance far surpassing the wanton gyrations of Bollywood Hrithik Roshan/Aishwarya Rai or Tamil film Urmila Matondkar/Prabhu Deva couplings, or music maestro A.R.Rahman at his best.

The performances equalling those of Nijinsky and Nureyev dancing L'après-midi d'un faune (from Stéphane Mallarmé's poem) revealed éros and agápe, Greek expressions of love. Éros as passion, seeing and appreciating the beauty in another and aspiring to know a spiritual truth, perhaps a truth through that cosmic dancer Shiva, as the Nataraja, lord of dance revealing the cyclical nature of the universe. Agápe, Plato thought of as the highest form of love, the love of man for god, or God, also the love for a wife and children. In 1970, the Beatles had finally sung “In the end the love you take, is equal to the love you make”. A lot of love was make, figuratively, metaphorically that night, owing to the efforts of a wide range of people who brought Amorous Delight; Amarushataka to life.

After show the audience birds twittered, they chit chatted, taking group photos and selfies. Indian memories were still fragrant, chords still vibrant and the air of love still charged sweet and sour, even in the colder light of the foyer, where normally the suspension of disbelieve begins to unravel.
Be-costumed dancers mingled, smiled, posed for photo after photo in the still electric theatre foyer, the scent of Jasmine still sweet from the dance.

The Sutra Dance Company’s excellent performance of Amorous delight was a triumph of near erotica. Together, the skillful ensemble held the prancing reigns of sadness, exhilaration, romance in its grasp, leading the audience this way and that, but always steady. It was a full gamut of emotion, visual and audible, melding choreography, poetry, Odissi Sangita (music), lighting and poignant graphics. A sublime hour rushed past and in true theatrical tradition we were left, like Dickens’ Oliver Twist, wanting more.

Chao's Caprices

Left Martin Bradley, right Chao Harn Kae

Chao Harn Kae’s ceramic and sculpture solo exhibition, at K.L’s Oriental & Cultural Association, along the Old Klang Road, displayed all the ingenuity of a modern revelatory whimsy. A former Malaysian Institute of Art painting graduate (1997), Chao lives mostly in Hong Kong these days creating bronzes, ceramics, painting in oils and making sculptures. He returned to Malaysia to hold his first solo exhibition. This was launched some days after a M.I.A. old boys and girls massive get-together at Datuk Ramil Ibrahim’s Sutra House.

Whimsies are capricious, fanciful, playful. Chao’s Human Beast Series whimsies had the quality of being drawn from memories of childhood, and/or the more capriciously metamorphic elements of Western mythology. Petite white and blue porcelain centaurs (perhaps children of those sons of Ixion), pranced from Thessaly and Ovid’s Metamorphoses onto aged Malaysian railway sleepers. A blue-faced mermaid, her body pale, her piscine tail brushed blue, rested on a rough crafted breeze block. In her broken limbed stance she was another Aphrodite, risen from the sea and echoing the other from Melos, by Alexandros of Antioch. By another block of distressed wood, a blue-armed, white figure lay with its torso and lower body coiled, like a snake. It was most reminiscent of Grendel’s mother, the Anglo-Saxon sea-witch, bane of beowulf, but this male perhaps more resembled the Greek Typhoeus (miniaturised).

Chao was conquering our hearts and minds with his tiny caprices, enchanting his visitors with their sad little faces, be-rouged and frequently coy. A lonely, lost couple sat in a small boat on a railway sleeper sea, one tiny blue rabbit-eared figurine looking this way, another black one that. It was as if they were observing we visitors, forever curious of our curiosity.

Elsewhere in that tantalising display was Chao's Portrait Series, with tall white plinths which enabled intricately manipulated ceramic busts (as the genealogy of those myriad creatures was uncertain perhaps austs is more appropriate) to look out. It all began, Chao intimated, with the one head and neck piece. It was a simple figure. You could imagine it to be the face of a clown, disguised with pale blue make-up, perhaps wearing a tight fitting earthen coloured coif head piece, or cowl. Is the face a mask? Where lies the real persona? Is it behind the mask, or is there no mask but a face, pinch-lipped and cautious-eyed as a character from some Moebius Bande Dessinee perhaps.

Chao developed the concept further. Other head and neck sculptures began appearing, but this time with cowls resembling those of medieval fools, jesters with ass ears like Shakespear’s Nick Bottom (1500s), or Jacob Cornelisz van Oostsanen's “Laughing Jester” (1515) and Hans Sebald Beham’s "A dancing fool” (1500s). Many of Chao’s series resembled busts of The Lost Boys’ in their Neverland animal costumes, hailing from Walt Disney’s cinematic “Peter Pan” animation (1953). They were cute, but with a distinctive otherness and each with a distinctive, often haunting, face. 

Seeing deer antlers reminded Chao of hands, with fingers. He developed the idea into the head and neck series, then replacing ears with out stretched hands, or placing a hand on the head between the ears. His craftsmanship allowed his visitors to accept his concepts. His deftness and design encouraged a wilful suspension of disbelief as we, the audience, were drawn into his endearing fantasies. 

Aside from the fascinating works of art displayed, and they were fascinating too, Chao admitted that the whole could not have been achieved without a little help from his friends. During the setting up, one friend would advise this, another that, until the display took the splendid shape it was in when I visited. The exhibition visitor was immediately struck by the uniqueness of the display, and of the display materials themselves. To present Chao’s captivating works to their fullest potential, plinths and exhibition blocks had been constructed of breeze-blocks, sections of railway sleepers, distressed and corroded metal troughs as well as the usual white stands, of varying sizes, this resulted in a meld of materials which was both eye-catching and mesmerising.

For the Arno River, Gallarate

Ettore Favini

Captive silver river mirror 

illuminating presenting intellect

Reflection/refraction

Dissipating in darkness 

Permission of luminosity

Permits memory of light 

Reveals delving imaginings

In dolce dialectic

Urban Mining

Mimics mines

Extracting elusive elements

Within Contemporary critiques

Timeless river stretches

Gaul to Gallarate

Echoing meadows

Bound by grassy debates

Intricacies of Modernity

Forgotten Futurismo

Dripping typewritten notes

Presenting word ephemera

Potential poesie

Fragile as life

Fades into lacuna

Please mind the gap

All that is mined

Has been minded

Considerations of context

Collected in collaboration 

Nascent and Renaissance 

Genesis of art

Eternal

Yet strangely irrevocably present 

Ma*Ga quick silver envelopes

Trite tributaries of meaning

Landings of dogma

Jetties of jetsam 

Swift Bats as MIA Gathers

Swift Bats dodged in the humid Malaysian night. Two young red dressed Indian girls swayed and danced Odissi while fireflies flitted around the octgonal stage, at Sutra house. It was the begnning of a rare night's entertainment. 

MIA founder Chung Chen Sun shared his thoughts while performers waited and his audience clapped. Soft songs sought ready ears as one Chinese singer sang to acoustic guitar, speeches abounded, more songs, keyboard and welcome greeting by Malaysian dance maestro Ramli Ibrahim. 

The cream of MIA mingled, ate, ate some more and reminded each other of the need for creativity. The time expanse of the seating was overtaken only by the length of the food queue. Sivarajah Natarajan's The Crowning Glory exhibition hid its brilliance behind pots of masala and crispy, fresh, roti cannai. I braved the food queue and then wrote under a tree fern, watched over by a statue of Ganesha.

Ex MIA students rued the loss of a city statue, others the pairing down of courses at the new Institute. You could feel the commitment to creativity and to each other. I was glad to, momentarily, feel part of the whole.

The Blue Lotus issue 3

Luo Qi and my two essays

My two essays in this book, published in Korea

The Blue Lotus Spring issue coming soon.......

The Shock of the New - National Gallery, Singapore, a Review

(With all due respect to the late Australian Art Critic Robert Hughes.)

In this case the 'new' is both ‘old’ and ‘new’. 

The 'new' Singapore National Gallery was opened on 24 November 2015, and is housed in the former 'old' Singapore City Hall and Supreme Court buildings, originally designed by Frank Dorrington Ward between 1937 and 1939. Those buildings stand in front of the historical Padang grounds (playing fields) in Singapore. 

The new National Gallery Singapore was designed by Jean-François Milou of StudioMilou and represents an amalgam of those preserved Colonial buildings in the heart of art Singapore. Of course there are contemporary architectural nuances, curtesy of StudioMilou and their local consultants (CPG Consultants), replete with a sculptural entrance sheltered by a curving canopy made from gold filigree metal and glass which hangs over the entrance and a glass and metal roof structure supported by an avenue of architectural ‘trees’. The buildings feature ionic-style columns, an oxidised copper tower and pale grey stonework, while the new galleries attempt to give insights into South East Asian Contemporary and Modern Art.

The Gallery's website offers this insight.

“National Gallery Singapore is a new visual arts institution which oversees the largest public collection of modern art in Singapore and Southeast Asia. The Gallery is housed in two national monuments—former Supreme Court and City Hall—that have been beautifully restored and transformed into this exciting venue in the heart of the Civic District.

Reflecting Singapore’s unique heritage and geographical location, the Gallery will feature Singapore and Southeast Asian art in its long-term and special exhibitions. It will also work with leading museums worldwide to co-present Southeast Asian art in a wider context, positioning Singapore as a regional and international hub for the visual arts.” 

I arrived on Wednesday, by taxi, at the Coleman Street entrance, to a distinct lack of signage. At that moment the most vital piece of information was, where in this new art Gallery is the loo. The Ladies was quite convenient, a hop and step away to the right. The Gents, however, was a long convoluted trek past the minimalist merchandising area, past Galley & Co, around the back of the Keppel Centre for Art Education and along past lifts and grey slate walls to yet another Ladies without an art poster, banner or adult piece of art to be seen anywhere along the circuitous route. I had to backtrack slightly to notice the minimalist male figure, barely noticeable from the surrounding walls. It was a good loo, but it wasn't a good start.

Gallery & Co was a cafe, of sorts. The counter area was minimalist, as were the dubious delights on offer. I opted for a canned fruit drink, sat and used the WIFI to download the National Gallery Ap. It installed quite quickly, but was little help. I guess that I had expected something like Waze to guide me around. The Ap. didn’t.

The (no doubt) ingenious design of the combined Colonial buildings was entirely lost on me as I struggled to find where the art gallery actually was. At this point a large sign saying WELCOME TO SINGAPORE’S NATIONAL GALLERY would have helped, with maybe a painting or two just to emphasise the fact that we all were, in fact, within an art gallery. Even the Gallery Map depicts the fusion of architecture on the cover, rather than a painting, and the mini brochure National Gallery Singapore At A Glance has the domed Supreme Court on the cover. Art enters only on page two, with a minute image of Lui Kang, ‘Life by the River’, 1975 being dominated by a huge photograph of yet another architectural feature of the new Gallery (pages one and two).

Exiting the cafe and merchandising area (Gallery & Co.) I was confronted by a huge hall of emptiness (on two levels no less) with not an artwork in sight. I wanted to be informed. I wanted to be wowed, I wanted to have my breath taken away, not by the architecture but by the content of the Gallery. I was quickly realising that I was entering hallowed halls where artworks were sacred objects, to be hidden way and revered. While the architecture was both Colonial and contemporary, the Gallery’s approach to museology seemed staid, archaic. We were back to the days of reverential silence, with the curator as high priest. 

I sidled over to join the queue for tickets. It turned out to be a queue for information, tickets  ($20, concession $15) were down the escalator. The understated signage, while being sleek contemporary and very designerish, was beginning to get bloody irritating. And that, I am afraid, was my overall first impression of this freshly constructed Singaporean behemoth - enormous, empty and uncommunicative, with a huge sense of Alice’s tumble. I wondered, and started to look for the White Rabbit.

Tumbling down the escalator, metaphorically not physically, eventually I landed at the Earthwork (1979) exhibition, by Tang Da Wu. And a most impressive beginning it was too. I stumbled into other galleries wrapped by grandiose law accoutrements, majestic polished wood, magisterial chair, antique cases containing some history of the region. But any learning was minimised by the sheer weight of that wood. It seemed that the ancient wood had as much power as the contemporary glass and metal, enough to wrench any glory from mere pictorial art.

Only ‘Beauty Beyond Form’, an exhibition of Wu Guanzhong’s works, was able to stand up to that crushing weight of architecture. In 2013, I had seen some of those works, at the Singapore Art Museum (SAM, opened 1996), in a showing called ‘Seeing the Kite Again’ but it is always a joy to see them again.

Like most national museums or national galleries, it is inadvisable to attempt to see everything in one shot, foolish in fact to think that you can. I left off with much more to see, than had been seen.

That evening, an American Surrealist friend (living in Singapore) had asked me, over a most refreshing Mint Berry Gin Fizz (Gin, Creme de Cassis, Pressed Lemon) in Dempsey House, Dempsey Road, just what I had thought of the new National Gallery and, before I could answer, he chipped in "underwhelming?", and he was right for so many reasons. I could have retorted no! Not underwhelming! But overwhelming if we are talking about the architecture, but held back to listen to his opinion.

Not really wanting to compare the gargantuan new National Gallery with Singapore’s contemporary art museum, SAM, which is just about right in size and approach; however, it is difficult to imagine the need for such a large space as the National Gallery for Singaporean art when there is so little of it. At best you might claim just over 100 years of art making in Singapore, hardly enough to constantly fill such a huge space with rotating artworks and, of course, if not rotated, staid.

While SAM remains somewhat romantic and accessible, the new Gallery makes the same mistake as many major institutions. First impressions (which are usually those you remember most) are that the National Gallery is more concerned with its own impressiveness than it is with visitor communication. It produces large spaces to show how  powerful the institution is, minimalist signage and lack of posters/banners which  emphasises not the artistic merits of works housed there but, once again, the Colonial and Contemporary architecture. SAM holds that delicate balance of conservation, preservation and visitor contentment. To date the National Gallery fails in all but its concentration on architecture.

The fresh visitor to any gallery or museum needs to be informed from the outset where they are, what there is on offer and how to get to see it. The National Gallery, London, elects to drape long banners to remind you where you are, just in case you missed the text outside. The Scottish National Gallery, in its present incarnation, has something similar telling what it is and what to expect. It is a pity, for the National Gallery, Singapore has some outstanding contributions to museology including the Crossing Cultural Boundaries gallery, but these gems are not advertised as the visitor walks in, especially through the Coleman Street entrance - visitors arriving by taxi or from parking their cars. Too much attention had been paid to architecture and not enough to signage, to assist the visitors who currently pay $20 for the privilege of being confused.

I can understand that if what we now see is only a beginning. There is plenty of room for the National Gallery, Singapore, to grow, as grow it must. But there is the feeling that the doors were opened too far in advance and that the Gallery needed a test run before opening to the public. As of my visit, a week hence, and some four months since its opening, the National Gallery, Singapore remains somewhat bipolar, architecture vs visual art. At the moment architecture draws the visitors, but does not sustain enough interest to pull visitors into the environment and lead them through the various galleries, as interesting as they may be. It was a brave idea, but needing a tad more thought. Meanwhile, I shall always visit SAM, a more homogeneous environment.

Nota Bene

Why, in its South East Asian inclusiveness of Burma, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and of course Singapore, does Cambodia get excluded. Just a thought.

Plus…….

On the label to 

Victorio C Edades, Galo B Ocampo and Carlos “Botong” Franciso (b.1895-d.1985, b. 1913-d. 1983, b. 1912-d. 1969; Philippines)

Mother Nature’s Bounty Harvest

1935

Oil on  Canvas

There is the inscription “….Sinuous, asymmetrical lines reflect the artists’ interest in Art Nouveau.”

Its a small point but shouldn’t that be Art Deco. A style that was rife in Manila and Bandung during the 1930s. Also no mention is made of the influence of the Mexican painter and muralist Diego Rivera, whose style the picture clearly emulates.