In these dark times I have been diving deeply into the wonder that is William Shakespeare. I was prompted to do so by discovering (via Twitter) a substack by Shakespeare expert Sir Jonathon Bate. He is posting small videos from his course on Shakespeare at Warwick University along with pieces he has had published over the years. These include book … [Read more...] about Shakespeare
Mother: Stories from the NGV Collection
Pauline and I visited this exhibition on the 2nd of July, 2026, just before it closed on the 12th of July 2026. We weren't sure it met the full advertised brief of an exploration of both universal and culturally specific experiences of motherhood - from private transformation and societal expectation to intergenerational trauma and loss, mythology … [Read more...] about Mother: Stories from the NGV Collection
Cartier 3
Following on from my first two blogs about my visit to the Cartier exhibition at the NGV on the 11th of June 2026, (here and here) my final one is centred on the last gallery. All of the galleries were designed to look like jewel boxes which I didn't attempt to capture on camera. Both the idea and its execution were well done. In this final one the … [Read more...] about Cartier 3
Cartier 2
This is my second blog on the Cartier exhibition which we saw on the 11th of June 2026. You can see the other two here and here. It's a very big exhibition and you could easily spend two hours there - if you have the energy. I managed an hour and a half and captured about a quarter of it. The galleries are designed as jewel boxes but I didn't get a … [Read more...] about Cartier 2
Cartier 1
I went, with my sister Pauline, and Joe, to the Cartier exhibition on the 11th of June 2026 and enjoyed it a lot. It's on until the 4th of October 2026 so you have plenty of time to get to it. As members we attended the curator's talk which gave us a lot of information about the House or Maison as it was called throughout. A wise father, gave a … [Read more...] about Cartier 1
Books May-June 2026
Unquiet, Linn Ullman Reads like an autobiography but is described as fiction which is tricky. I thought it was all true, no doubt because of this review (probably behind a paywall in the TLS) which inspired me to read it. Her parents are Ingmar Bergman and Liv Ullman. I've always loved his films, and her in them and have read quite a bit about … [Read more...] about Books May-June 2026