Getting out of Venice and into Normandie
RIP David Hockney
I wore my “End Bossiness Soon” pin to honor Hockney and match with his lovely portrait of his caretaker at the Serpentine Gallery. There were pins for sale, but mine was a present from my friend, the painter, Pieter Athmer, who was also a friend of Hockney’s.
Ginevra pretending to be a “Bossy Boots” while wearing her “End Bossiness Soon” pin (also from Pieter).
Me in front of the outdoor Mural of David Hockney’s work at the Serpentine Gallery in London’s Kensington Gardens.
Bienvenue and welcome back to Musée Musings, your idiosyncratic guide to Paris and art. When last I wrote, I was at the beginning of a 7 day stay in Venice. In bed, with a clear head and a weak body. I was thirsty, so I drank, I was hungry, so I ate, I was bored, so I made lists. If I had my computer with me, I could have written, or at least written a major chunk of, a novel. Instead, I wrote lists, in longhand.
The first list was, reasonably enough, the times I have gotten sick on vacation. I recalled the time in Luxor, Egypt when both my husband and I got sick at the same time (our fault, raw salad, completely stupid). He spent his time on the toilet. I spent mine vomiting wherever and whenever the urge arose, which was often. We were in Luxor but we didn’t visit Luxor. And we didn’t get to Abu Simbal, either. We barely got back to Cairo. Luckily, we met a group of Spanish pharmacists on the train from Luxor to Cairo. They were prepared for exactly what ailed my husband and me. The son of a doctor, my husband quickly swallowed the pills they offered us. Much less trusting, I hesitated. But when I saw how much better he was, I took my pills. Another time, somewhere in Spain, my husband and I were on a bus, going somewhere else. I remember vomiting into a plastic bag as my husband ignored me and fellow passengers cast sidelong glances at me. I have lots of vomit stories, I never travel without a plastic bag. Vomit stories and migraine stories are not new but a fatigue story is something completely new.
My next list was of my travels, mostly in Europe, (except when we lived in Australia) starting with the ones I took BC (Before Charlie - my husband). Then the trips I took with C and then those I took with C and Ginevra, followed by those I took with C, G and Nicolas. Those trips were followed by ones I took with G and N. Now, I take trips with either G or N but no longer both. I kept forgetting places and mixing up dates. Writing in longhand is a lot more work than typing on a computer. More work than it was worth.
After that, I compiled lists of universities at which I taught, college courses I created, even fellowships and grants I received. As the week wore on and I still couldn’t shake my fatigue, I began to think, seriously, about how I was going to get out of Venice. I don’t think there are many places as inconvenient to leave as Venice - Antarctica and outer space come to mind. The idea of a vaporetto was not appealing - the crowds, the swaying of the boat, the crisscrossing from one side of the Grand Canal to the other. The alternative? A water taxi. The logistics of which were not all that appealing either. But when we tried to reserve a water taxi 24 hours in advance - they were all booked. Back to the vaporetto. But how could Ginevra take two suitcases and me to the train station the morning of our departure? The only answer I could come up with was finding a hotel near the train station for our last night in Venice. Which I did, which required Ginevra to go back and forth three times from our Airbnb to the hotel - once with me and then once with each of our two suitcases. The night at the hotel and breakfast there the next morning convinced me that I am no longer a do-it-yourself person, I have become a hotel person. The people at the hotel, unlike our Airbnb host, consider Customer Service an actual thing. They found someone to take our luggage from the hotel to the train station where the kind people at Trenitalia took over. They got me from the train station onto the train in Venice and from and to the train in Milan. It fell apart in Paris. Nobody came onto the train to help me get out of it. As we walked to the taxi stand, I should have stopped at one of the ‘Assistance’ kiosks that dot the train station.. But I didn’t, I guess I just wanted to get out of the train and put the trip behind me. The wait for a taxi was nearly an hour. But the taxi we finally got into was driven by the perfect taxi driver, one who took us directly to where we wanted to go..
My strength returned once I got back to Paris. In 2 weeks, Ginevra and I visited 12 museums. About which I will tell you soon. Then it was time for our second trip, to London and after a rocky train ride, the fatigue of Venice was mostly a bad memory. In London for 6 mostly cool and sunny days, we walked from one museum to another, stopping at gorgeous parks to eat sandwiches or take-away from my favorite place, branches of which are scattered across London, Ottolenghi.
The photograph of the smiling Yorkshireman that greeting us at the National Portrait Gallery.
One of the museums we visited was the Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Gardens to see David HOCKNEY’s Four Seasons in Normandie and a dozen or so of his most recent portraits. Although we booked a month ago, when we went, it was only a few days after Hockney’s death. It was a bittersweet feeling - sadness that Hockney was gone but gratitude for all the wonderful works of art he left behind for us to enjoy. I’ll tell you about our London trip, soon. But today, in Memory of David HOCKNEY, a link to one of the several articles about him that I have written in the past several years. Thanks to everyone who has asked about my health. I’m still not sure exactly what happened. Gros bisous, Dr. B.
So what did you do during the confinement? David Hockney’s year in Normandie
TO READ MORE OF MY POSTS ON HOCKNEY, GO TO MAGNIFYING GLASS ICON ON THE HOME PAGE AND TYPE IN HOCKNEY. AMONG THE ARTICLES ARE THESE:
From iPads to Scrolls Ma Normandie, David Hockney. Galerie Lelong, Paris
A lot of Anderson and a Little Bit of Hockney Hockney exhibition at FLV begins at FIGURE 24
The Art Historian’s Artist: David Hockney 25 Fondation Louis Vuitton Hockney exhibition FLV continues
i have this urge this compulsion to share my enjoyment ma normandie Hockey exhibition, FLV finale