A DAY OUT IN MANCHESTER - PART 1

My lovely husband and I have just had a really interesting day out In Manchester.
Our first visit was to the HOME Theatre and Gallery Complex, which was a pleasant surprise. We hadn’t been here before and it had been on our to-do list for some time.

After a warming drink in the upstairs cafe we explored the site; looked through the upcoming events brochures and finally made it to the gallery where we experienced some surreal pieces of art work.

The exhibition was by Glaswegian artist Rachel Maclean who treated us to a highly unusual yet fun show. Although I personally didn’t really understand any of it – I just wished that she had been there to explain to me- you know the type of thing; her vision and what on earth was going through her mind when she conceived her ideas.

Honestly, I could appreciate the amount of hard work that went into creating her art pieces, which included gigantic sculptures of friendly looking kid monsters being attacked by wedding dressed rat like creatures plus huge wall hangings with so much strange details on them that I could have spent hours trying to decipher their meaning as well as a visual film of some bizarre apocalyptic minion type person asking for a salted caramel coffee.

I know that this sounds phantasmagorical but it was energetic and invigorating to the eye and I absolutely adored it!!

However, I did have reservations about her conceptual explanation that I read in her brochure. I don’t think that she fulfilled the jargon that she gave behind the exhibits but that is, I believe, one of the problems with conceptual art- the ambiguous and often bogus rhetoric that accompanies it.  Mind you I did enjoy the show and I came out feeling excited and eager to see what other artistic delights were on offer in Manchester today.

So after a quick soup lunch with my lovely husband at Philpott’s on Oxford Street (Why is it I always choose the wrong soup and my husband the better one!) we made our way to the Manchester City Art Gallery. I love this gallery as it has one of my all time favourite paintings in it; ‘Work’ by Ford Maddox Brown.

Every time that I see this painting I discover something new that captures my attention. This week it was the woman’s hat in the foreground of the picture and how she could see through the brim and her feet were painted so clearly and minutely. Exquisite- absolutely loved it!

From the ridiculous to the sublime in a couple of hours what better way could you spend the time!

Thought for the day; Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.
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