Eve Arnold

Eve Arnold’s maiden name was Cohen and she was born in Philadelphia on April 21st, 1912.  Her parents were Russian/Jewish and her father was a rabbi and she became an Arnold post-marriage and then divorce.  Arnold had no formal artistic or photographic training but she seems to have been bitten by the photography bug while working at a photo-finishing facility in New York in 1946.  This led to her enrolling at the New School for Social Research in Manhattan in 1948 where she encountered the art director of Harper’s Bazaar, Alexey Brodovitch, who provided her with the photographic skills necessary to begin her career.

Arnold’s first decade as a photojournalist involved much work but little recognition; during this period she photographed Marilyn Monroe in particular a huge number of times and it was her shots of Monroe during the filming of The Misfits (Monroe’s last film) which finally brought her some well-deserved recognition.  This belated success opened her previous work up to a wider audience who who were now able to view the vast range of subjects Arnold had covered.

Marilyn Monroe - The Misfits

By this time she had clocked up a prodigious amount of work and global travel, visiting countries such as China, South Africa and Russia which were largely untraveled.  Her photos of luminaries such as Malcolm X and Queen Elizabeth II ensured her popularity.

In 1961, Arnold and her son Frank moved to the United Kingdom where they settled permanently.  She worked for the Sunday Times where she began to use colour photography and continued to produce what have become iconic portrait shots of famous and not-so-famous people.  She did not feature in a solo exhibition until 1980 and this was back in Brooklyn, New York and was a presentation of her photos from her Chinese travels.

Josephine Baker

A View of the Archbishop's Palace, Lambeth - 1790

So Turner was clearly an early starter and this talent was nurtured at the Royal Academy of Art which he began to attend in 1789.  The education he received was a wide curriculum; Turner was clearly a landscape artist but also showed a passion for architectural sketches (Lambeth Palace is an example).  Turner left the Royal Academy in 1793 and begun to travel widely throughout Britain and (later) Europe.  He continued to exhibit at Royal Academy exhibitions and his submissions in watercolour and oil were widely acclaimed.

For our purposes, Turner did not complete many paintings of London but the ones he did are worth mentioning.  The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons is probably the est known; it depicts the accidental fire which destroyed the Houses of Parliament in 1834 and which Turner witnessed.  He made sketches at the time and subsequently painted several pieces of work based on those.

The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons - 1835

One more painting with a connection to London is quite possibly Turner’s most famous work; The Fighting Temeraire is the short title of the painting which is more formally known as The Fighting Temeraire tugged to her last Berth to be broken up and it depicts this legendary member of the British navy on her way to final destination to be broken up in 1838.  The painting is somewhat imaginative – there was no sunset on the day on question and two tugs rather than one are said to have pulled the Temeraire.  Minor details though and Turner regarded it as a seminal moment as the age of sail gave way to the age of steam.

The Fighting Temeraire - 1838

J.M.W. Turner  died in London on 19th December, 1851.  Read more about him here.

William Wordsworth

of the social values of the times in which he lived.  Wordsworth was certainly capable of that; in the same year (1802) in which he wrote ‘Composed….’, he wrote ‘London’ – a critique of the English people and their apparent selfish and tired nature.

Born in 1770, Wordworth was a Romantic and possibly the most famous one.  Poets of the Romantic Movement looked to nature for inspiration and viewed the natural world as the epitome of civilisation.  Wordworth was educated in the north of England  and introduced to poetry by his father.  Perhaps the beauty of the country side in which he grew up inspired his leadership of the Romantic Movement.  Wordsworth attended St. John’s College, Cambridge and after graduation in 1891 he began to spend time in Europe, fathering a child by the Frenchwoman Annette Vallon, before the hostile relationship between France and England forced him back across the channel.

The Treaty of Amiens which was signed between France and England in 1802 meant that Wordsworth could now travel back to France to see his daughter and her mother.  It was at the beginning of this journey, undertaken with his sister Dorothy, that the carriage in which they were traveling halted on Westminster Bridge.  Wordsworth, generally unimpressed by the city in which he lived, saw it in a different light (literally) as the sun was rising and penned the following sonnet:

‘ Earth hath 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 sleep
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!’

William Blake

talented of his era but who, during his lifetime, went largely unrecognised.  Although we regard him as a London poet, he actually spent some of his later years in Felpham, Sussex where he was employed illustrating the work of a fellow poet, William Hayley.

This article is not intended to be a William Blake biography but it’s worth looking briefly at his idiosyncratic views and the world he lived in before reading the poem he wrote about London in 1792.  Revolution was in the air in Europe and Blake was certainly a supporter.  He was quite possibly involved in the burning of Newgate prison, although he claims he was swept up and transported there by an angry mob.  Blake was certainly associated with two of the most revolutionary talking shops of the period, the London Corresponding Society and the Revolution Society.

So in 1792 he penned ‘London‘, a critique not just of the poverty and prostitution in the capital, but also of the encroaching capitalism that was beginning to take hold as London became a global marketplace.  The ‘hapless soldier‘ also gets a mention in verse three as a pointed reference to the monarchy and the military’s role in supporting it, sometimes against their will.

I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow,
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forg’d manacles I hear.

How the Chimney-sweeper’s cry
Every black’ning Church appalls;
And the hapless Soldier’s sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.

But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

It’s a simple, creative and illuminating poem about a city which is on the verge of becoming the most powerful in the world while failing to deal with the revolutionary feelings and poverty of many its inhabitants.

The Black Trinity

It was at Vogue that David Bailey really made his name though;  London was establishing itself as the fashion capital of the world in the 1960s and Bailey, along with contemporaries such as Terence Donovan and Brian Duffy, was there to capture the events and celebrities on film.  These three photographers ultimately became celebrities themselves, creating a kind of self-perpetuating circle in which everyone’s celebrity status rubbed off on everyone else.  It was noted portrait photographer Norman Parkinson who christened the three snappers ‘The Black Trinity’.

David Baileys portrait of the Krays

Bailey’s ‘Box of Pin-Ups’, published in 1964, was probably his most iconic work and featured poster-prints of many of his celebrity clients from that era.  It included names such as Mick Jagger, Andy Warhol, The Beatles and Rudolph Nureyev, among others.  It was the first such release by any photographer and proved that Bailey’s name could sell such an item in away unknown previously.  The set contained what is probably the most famous portrait of Ronnie and Reggie Kray, the East End gangsters whose allure allowed them to become part of the London celebrity scene.

At the same time it was Vogue magazine which provided Bailey with his day job, so to speak.  He was an incredibly prolific producer of material during his stint with the magazine and his ability to photograph the supermodels of the era, such as Jean Shrimpton (who became his girlfriend) and Grace Coddington.  Coddington said of him:

“It was the sixties, it was a raving time and Bailey was unbelievably good looking.  He was everything that you wanted him to be – like The Beatles but accesible – and when he went on the market everyone went in.  We were all killing ourselves to be his model, although he hooked up with Jean Shrimpton pretty quickly.”

As David Bailey’s star continued to shine, he began to move into other artistic mediums. Working in television, he directed advertisements and documentaries, notably programmes about Andy Warhol, Luchino Visconti and Cecil Beaton.  In later years he directed more shows for various television companies including the BBC and South Bank Film.

Bailey and Jean Shrimpton

Album covers were another strong feature of Bailey’s work and the late 1960s saw a selection of work for artists such as The Rolling Stones, Cat Stevens and Marianne Faithfull.  David Bailey is still working now and seems to constantly add to his inventory of books published, the latest being Heroes,  a selection of portraits of British soldiers in Afghanistan.  Similarly his exhibitions can be easily visited around the country and occasionally abroad.

David Bailey

can surely be no more famous name than that of David Bailey.  Best known now for his participation in, and capturing on film of, London’s ‘swinging sixties’, Bailey could be described as the archetypal East End boy made good.

Bailey was born in Leytonstone, in the East End, in 1938 but when a German bomb destroyed the family house during the Blitz in 1941, the Baileys relocated to East Ham where they remained throughout David’s childhood.  Bailey did not attend school regularly, even when he was sent to a private shcool – he suffered from dyslexia and during the war lessons were occasionally interrupted by German air raids.  He did develop a passion for natural history though and this seems to have been what kick-started an interest in photography.

Leaving school at fifteen, he became a copy boy at the Yorkshire Post’s offices on Fleet Street  before heading into National Service in 1956 and a stint in Singapore.  In what may be an apocryphal tale, perhaps a piece of embellishment or maybe even true, Bailey says that the theft of his trumpet prompted the purchase of a Rolleiflex camera as a means to find an outlet for his creativity.

John French photography

When his stint in National Service had finished, his enthusiasm for photography continued and he purchased his second camera, a Canon Rangefinder.  Finding himself unqualified to study photography at college because of his poor educational record, Bailey obtained a post as second assistant to David Ollins, an advertising photographer. Second assistant was something akin to a dogsbody and Bailey continued to search for alternative work.

Eventually, in 1959,  he became a photographer’s assistant at the John French Studio, a business which concentrated on fashion and portrait photography and strived to introduce some clever innovation into the business of advertising in print media.

Part Two follows…..

That number of paintings clearly rivals the collections held by any galleries around the world and the tragedy is that most of these paintings are not in public view.  This is the motive behind the ongoing comprehensive effort to document every one of these paintings which will be (and are) displayed on a website at www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/ .  That website should be complete sometime in 2012.  Why have these paintings been largely unavailable?  Well they’re sort of viewable but you’ll have to make the effort to visit town halls, schools and various government offices and taxpayer funded locations to have a glimpse of the art.

There’s a few good examples of beautiful pieces of work and Jock McFadyen’s painting of a piece of the platform at Aldgate tube station can only be seen by visiting the Department of Transport building in Westminster.  Original from Scotland, McFadyen has spent much of his career in London and has clearly been influenced by the city.

Jock McFadyen - Aldgate

Another noteworthy painting, this one by French Impressionist Camille Pissarro, is a landscape of the London borough of Acton and if you want to have a glimpse you’ll have to go the local history centre in Ealing.

Camille Pissarro - Acton landscape

One of the more interesting paintings noted by the BBC is by an artist named C. A. Forby. This chap was not just a painter but a fireman during the London Blitz in the Second World War.  This was not in fact an unusual situation – an odd consequence of the Blitz was the relatively large number of firefighters who painted scenes from the aftermath of German bombing runs but Corby’s work is little special; he ripped the canvas on which the scene is painted from the roof of a passing vehicle.  To see this work you’ll need to go down to headquarters of the Hampshire Fire and Rescue service in Eastleigh.

C. A. Forby - A Quiet Corner of London

We’ve already mentioned the Pissarro and the McFadyen works but possibly the most famous painting in the national collection and one that has been on display since 1965 is Pablo Picasso’s 1925 work, The Three Dancers. This one can be seen all comers at the Tate Modern on the South Bank.

Picasso - The Three Dancers

So hopefully by sometime within 2012, everyone will be able to go online to view this incredible collection and appreciate what until now has only been available to various cicil servants.  One might argue that all these works should be publicly viewable in one of London’s many galleries but for now, if you really want to see the item in person, you’ll have to work your way round the council archives and government buildings.

Derain, painted by Maurice de Vlaminck, 1906

incredibly prolific one.  In 1906, Derain spent enough time in London to paint 30 pictures, 29 of which are still thankfully in existence.

Back to he beginning though and André Derain was born in France, in the village of Chatou, Ile de France, in 1880.  In his younger years he he displayed no artistic inclinations of any sort and it wasn’t until he was 18 and studying to be an engineer at the Académie Camillo that he began to take art classes with Eugène Carrière.  In the coincidental way of things, it was here he met Henri Matisse.

By 1890 he was painting seriously and sharing a studio with Maurice de Vlaminck; landscapes were his project of choice at this stage.  Following a period in the French army, Matisse persuaded Derain’s parents to allow him to forgo the engineering career for a life in art.  His persuasion was successful and Derain subsequently enrolled in the Académie Julian.

It was Matisse, Durain and de Vlaminck whose distinctive painting style led a noted contemporary critic to describe the work as ‘wild beasts’ or les Fauves.  The Fauvist movement was born and in 1906 an art dealer named Ambroise Vollard – Vollard supported, among others, Van Gogh, Gaugion, Picasso and Renoir – contracted Derain to go to London and produce a series of paintings in the Fauvist style.

Fauvism is close to Impressionism in it’s style and can be described as favouring the use of non-naturalistic colour and brushwork over realism.  It was not always a well-received genre and the movement lasted only a few years but those who appreciate Fauvism promote the accessibility of the style and with good reason.

Derain clearly enjoyed himself in London and his numerous paintings of Tower Bridge, London and the Thames remain among the most popular from his time there.

Charing Cross Bridge 1906

Big Ben 1906

T. G. Rosenthal, the noted art critic, said the following of Derain’s London work:

“Not since Monet has anyone made London seem so fresh and remain so quintessentially English.  Some of his views of the Thames use the Pointillist technique of multiple dots, although by this time, because the dots have become much larger, it is rather more simply the separation of colours called Divisionism and it is peculiarly effective in conveying the fragmentation of colour in moving water in sunlight.”

Tower Bridge 1906

London Bridge 1906

Following Derain’s return to France, he became reacquainted with Pablo Picasso and sold his entire studio to another contemporary art dealer, Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler.  This gave him financial freedom to begin to experiment with other mediums, in particular stone sculpture.

As they matured, Derain and the other Fauvists began to move away from that movement.  Woodcuts became a favourite and he was increasingly influenced by the Old Masters (pre-1800).  He moved inexorably towards the mainstream, winning the Carnegie Prize for artists in 1928 and became increasingly prolific in his international exhibitions.

André Derain died in Garches, Ile de France, close to his birthplace in 1954.

“A broken heart is a very pleasant complaint for a man in London if he has a comfortable income.” – George Bernard Shaw

“A man may earn from the bible to be a more thorough gentleman than if he had been brought up in all the drawing rooms in London.” – Charles Kingsley

“As to London we must console ourselves with the thought that if life outside is less poetic than it was in the days of old, inwardly it’s poetry is much deeper.” – Goldwin Smith

“Gentlemen never wear brown in London.” – Lord Curzon

“Hitler bombed London into submission but in fact it created a sense of national solidarity.” – Tom Paulin

“I can walk about London and see a society that seems an absolutely revolutionary change from the 1950s, that seems complatetly and utterly different, and then I can pick up on something where you suddenly see that it’s not.” – Penelope Lively

“I certainly have no plans to leave London.  It’s a great town.” – Ewan McGregor

“I go to London, my favourite city in the world and I feel at home.” – Boris Becker

“London is a roost for every bird.” – Benjamin Disraeli

“I love going into the centre of London because people don’t give a monkey’s about you or who you are.  You can be in a restaurant and no one notices you or if they do they won’t show it.” – Teddy Sheringham

“I loved London and I didn’t want to leave.” – Delta Burke

“London is the clearing house of the world.” – Joseph Chamberlain

“I think London’s sexy because it’s so full of eccentrics.” – Rachel Weisz

“I think that London is very much like that.  I find there’s humour in the air and people are interesting.  And I think it’s a place which is constantly surprising.” – Colin Firth

“I went to London because for me, it was the home of literature.  I went there because of Dickens and Shakespeare.” – Ben Okri

“London is a modern Babylon.” – Benjamin Disraeli

“London is one of the most enchanting places I’ve ever been on this planet.” – Don Johnson

“London, that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained.” – Arthur Conan Doyle

“London, thou art the flower of cities all.” – William Dunbar

“On March 4th, 1830, I arrived in London where a new world seemed opened to me.” – Henry Bessemer

“The melancholy London – I sometimes imagine that the souls of the lost are compelled to walk through it’s streets perpetually.  One feels them passing like a whiff of air.” – William Butler Yeats.

The Battle of Cable Street

It has remained a magnet for immigrants to the U.K. and the changes in demographics have reflected the way immigrant communities have moved into the poorer areas, made some money and then moved out to the suburbs.  One of the most significant events in British political history actually took place in Cable St. in the East End on the 4th October 1936.  Oswald Mosley and his British Union of Fascists (BUF) planned a march through the East End, essentially to intimidate the Jewish residents and other immigrant communities.

10,000 police, many mounted, were on hand to try and make sure their passage was assured but opposing them were an estimated 300,000 anti-fascists, East End locals and assorted East End ‘names’ and other hard men who had no desire to let outsiders onto their territory.  In what has been called the largest street fight in history (although the only clashes were actually between protestors and police), Mosley and the BUF were forced to cancel the march and disperse towards Hyde Park.

It was an immensely violent clash and arguably ended the fascist movement in the U.K. at

Oswald Mosley & his Blackshirts

a time when fascism was on the rise in other areas of Europe and the Second World War was only three years away.  The government responded by passing the Public Order Act 1936 which required police authorisation for marches and also banned the use of political uniforms – check out the picture.

Post War Investment

Since the Second World War, slum clearance and investment has improved the social structure of the East End immensely.  There have been significant setbacks such as job losses due to the closure of the docks and other industry but the enormous regeneration undertaken on Canary Wharf and the Isle of Dogs has ensured the area remains economically viable.

The mini-Bangladeshi area of Brick Lane has been an area of immigration from South Asia since at least the mid-1970s and is now regarded as London’s Curry Capital, an impressive achievement given how much curry the English are said to eat.

Brick Lane

What has been termed gentrification has also found it’s way into the East End.  As property prices have risen significantly throughout the last twenty years, purchasers have moved into affordable areas which previously they would not have considered.  Hoxton and Shoreditch are the East End’s prime examples and a vibrant artistic community has developed in these areas.

In 2012 London will host the Summer Olympics and Paralympics and these games will be centered on the East End district of Stratford.  Billions of pounds have been spent in anticipation of the event and the legacy should be lasting.

The East End still has it’s problems related to poverty and crime but it remains a fascinating melting pot which will be exposed to the world in 2012.