Across the Pond

If you've been reading my blog for the past couple of weeks, I've been posting stuff that I did over the summer. It's a list mostly based on a Pinterest board I made. On that same list are the following items:

• Pack a suitcase and go on a trip
• Ride an airplane to an exotic location
• Ride a boat
• Explore. Dream. Discover.

Holy cow. Can I tell you that I crossed these out as well? You see, this part of the list were "wishes". There were no plans, no intentions to pull out the suitcase from storage, nor a travel budget squirreled away. But the universe presented a most awesome adventure. I feel truly blessed.

So here's the packed suitcase and the seat in the airplane.

Where to?

 TADA! London, baby!

 The atmosphere remains celebratory from the 

Queen's Diamond Jubilee...

...and the Summer Olympics and Paralympics.

This wasn't my first time in London but I love coming back. The city is always vibrant and exciting. This time, I decided to see the city from the River Thames.

I rode this boat which is like a water taxi.

Here's the view from the river on a drizzly day. 

 I disembarked at this pier to visit this art gallery:

 The Tate Britain

The Tate Britain carries the largest collection of British art in the world, dating from the 1500's to the present day.  There are masterpieces, as well as modern and contemporary art. 

Here are a few highlights of my visit:

A display on "Victorian Sentimentality" featuring sentimental images of people in both painting and sculpture. This one is of siblings.

 And here, a mother and child by Hamo Thornycroft 

called "The Kiss".

This one's my favorite called "Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose" by John Singer Sargent. I want to find a garden just like this and remain innocent and carefree.

A section exclusively for Frank Bowling's Poured Paintings.

The exhibit is called "Drop, Roll, Shake, Drip", the techniques he uses to play with paint. {I think I'll try these out for a future blah to TADA! project.}

The Tate Britain also hosts the largest collection of works by JMW Turner (Joseph Mallord William Turner). I never heard of him before. He is described as "an English Romantic landscape painter whose expressionistic studies of light, color, and atmosphere were unmatched in their range and sublimity." He is also known for his watercolors and printmaking.

He carried sketchbooks when he traveled, often drawing with pencil and adding color later on.

As he traveled across Europe, his watercolor palette changed depending on the light in that city, and his experiments with newly-developed paints. 

JMW Turner was also known for his sea scenes.

"Copying was a vital part of an artist's education in the 18th and 19th centuries", thus paper and pencils were readily available for an interactive element. Above is my interpretation of JMW Turner's seascape.

There are areas where one could display what they made.

My art {I even signed it!} on display at the Tate Britain. My two minutes of fame {or until it gets covered by another person's sketch}. I relished it, fully accepting that the art I make isn't museum-worthy.

But at the museum shop, I opened a book that led me to this line.

And while my art is a humble blah to TADA!, that's alright by me.