Art making history- but no story

John Singer Sargent is one of the most famous American artists of fine de siecle and one of the most famous portraitists ever. And this portrait, of Gertrude Vernon, or Lady Agnew of Lochnaw, was his big break. I "met" Lady Agnew in the National Gallery of Scotland of Edinburgh, where she resides, and I have never forgotten her.

Of course, it is a beautiful portrait, where the colours and shapes .. work. And I do love the way I can sense the softness of the fabrics, and the luxuriosness of silk. But, what makes this an outstanding portrait for me is the personality that shows. There is pride and confidence, but I also see humour and this definitely is not a boring person, there is a lot of character. I would wage that there is a story behind this painting and that the woman in it could not have lived an ordinary life. But, from the depth of www, her claim to fame, in life and a century later - is this portrait. And come to think of it- that is not bad in terms of legacy.

Love at first sight

First time I visited Tate, before it became Tate Britain, I fell in love. Typically for me, it was singularly one-sided, but unlike many other romances, it lasts. What more, my admiration grows at every encounter. Which brings me to the catch, because, of course, there is one. It is very hard for a painting to love me back.

There are many many grand and great paintings at the Tate. But the one that caught my heart was a small study of clouds, by John Constable. I love the idea of a framed piece of heaven. And how, even though it appears simple at first glance, there is so much going on and as much "action" as in other paintings where you expect it more.

If I was feeling philosophical, I would tell you that this is what I find fascinating about life. If you look deeper, and try to learn more, everything grows more interesting, and more often than not, there is so much more to things than what meets the eye. But, I am not feeling philosophical, so what I will say is that this is one of my favourite paintings of all time, and every time I am in London, I have to visit it. Because it makes me happy.

How I got my smell back

Arriving in Singapore, and more about that later, I noticed that I could not smell anything. In a way, my body did me a favour, but since pig-boy was out of the way, I quite fancied to smell the city. And, I have found the best cure! A ton or so of Wasabi really did the trick, and even though it was so strong and so fresh that I think I lost my sight for a while, once my eyes stopped to water, all my senses were fully recovered. Except, perhaps, the common sense.

Just my luck

Of course my flight to Singapore could not go without any adventures. First of all, the plane from Århus to Frankfurt was delayed, meaning that I had about ten minutes to cross from one terminal to another, which left me rather stressed and breathless. Breathless beeing the important point, since I started to smell something fishy as soon as I approached my seat. There was a distinct smell of.. something.. and it wasn´t me. Also, I was not the only one to react, since many of people passing were sniffing in the air...

To make a long story short, it turned out that the guy next to me was working, and living, on a pig farm. And pig farms smell. A lot. I am sure that he had showered, and he was very nice, but the smell.. oh the smell.

This was the one time I wished that I had been wearing a burka, since I could not very well cover my nose for the ten odd hours the flight took. Fortunately, I lost the sense of smell somewhere over Kiev. Many of my co-passengers, however, didn´t and I could see that they were wondering which one of us was the smelly one.

The effects of Schadefreude

Because I am prone to accidents and mishaps, I often get a, albeit brief, feeling of panic when I am about to do something out of the ordinary. I travel quite a lot, and since I am born in communinst Czechoslovakia have a liberal view on smuggling, but since the alcohole laws in Sweden changed have not smuggled anything. Yet, every time I am at the airport, at any airport, and am passing through the green line in customs, I cannot help thinking-what if they search me and they find something? And I try to look as innoncent as I can, and either smile at the custom officers, or avoid eye contact, in short what ever strategy I have just then decided would be the best one.

I am also afraid of mixing up time of important meetings, taking wrong meeting rooms etc etc. Until now I have never been afraid to go to the wrong airport though. In fact, it never even occured to me. So, imagine my surprise, when I, last time I was in Sweden, witnessed a couple having a huge fight because they have done just that. They had crossed the entire Stockholm going south west, to Bromma, when they should have crossed and gone north west to Arlanda. They had just realised their mistake and were furious with each other, as both claimed it was the other one´s fault. I tried not to eavesdrop, but by the state of them am fairly sure that they have filed for divorce by now.

So, there I am, Monday morning, happy about a mistake I haven´t done yet, and since there weren´t any free seats, I waited for the boarding standing by the exit. I was second in line, after a obviously very important and busy businessman. He was juggling betweens texting and calling on his Blackberry and was the image of a busy bee and, needless to say, very very obnoxious and annoying. When the stewardess had checked his boarding pass he took off with zeal of his own, and you can imagine my surprise, not to mention his, when the opening he strode through, turned out to be glass. The bang made the entire terminal freeze. If he hadn´t been so pompous, I might have felt sorry for him, especially when I saw that he had made an imprint on the glass, where especially his left nostril was clearly visible, but he had been so full of himself that my schadefreude simply flourished. I giggled all the way to the airplane, and noticed only when I was just about to climb the stairs into the aircraft that this was, in fact, wrong plane. I had been so fuelled that I passed my plane and tried to board one that was going to Kiruna instead of Århus. So, boarding the wrong plane is a new worry of mine.

More covers..

The image is not the only thing that fascinates me on a cover. Some books also have recommendations- and I do have to admit, that more often they not, these serve the exactly wrong purpose with me. If you have a recommendation by an obscure little newspaper that you KNOW has no literary fame what so ever.. well then... you know that nobody of importance had anything better to say.. which means.. why not just skip the recommendation?

Honestly, I once saw a book in Sweden actually printed with a recommendation from Köpingbladet, and I wanted to cry. My Swedish favourite is when the book about the illustrious Mitford sisters was printed with recommendation claiming that Shakespear could not have written a better story. I dare say he didn't.

Of course, when one of Dan Brown´s was reprinted with the claim "probably the most intelligent and accomplished author of our time" not only was I hoping that Heineken would sue, but please? Really?

More judging..

Another cover I absolutely fell in love with. And apart of being, possibly the first blog in the history, this book breathes English countryside, English dry sense of humour and the mastery of the understated. It is, after all, The diary of a provincial lady, written in the late 20s.

The author lives in the country side with tho children and a husband, and runs a household of a Cook, who has bad temper, is touchy and whose preferred pudding is jelly, which the entire household hates, a series of Helps who all have their quirks and bad habits, apart from being extremely hard to find and even harder to keep, and finally an au-pair equivalent Mademoiselle, who not only has the latin temper, but who also makes running commentary of the household in French. Add a number of peciuliar neighbours, such as the snobby, ignorant and egocentric Lady B., who is hated by the entire county, a Vicar's wife, who is so prone to monologues and so drony that the only way to get rid of her is to fake death.. In short, this is a pick-me-up in book format, whether you have ten minutes or two hours to spend.

Incidentally, I booked a flight with British Airways today, and found to my great satisfaction that they offer many more titles than for example SAS. Flying BA, you can be a Lady, a Sir, and a Lord. An easy way to be a Lady for a day then..