White Riot

It's approaching summer in Paris. Of course, it's raining. It has, in fact, rained all week. Angry people have been kept indoors. When it stops raining and they're all been to see the flooded quais, as the Seine has burst its banks, they decide to do something else. In this case, demonstrate against, well, everything: the police, the state, the employment law changes, and anything else you care to think of. I inadvertently ran into the latest manifestation at the Canal St. Martin this afternoon.

The first thing I heard of it was the clump of the police down the street where I was window shopping in the rather chi-chi boutiques and ateliers of hand made goods. I'd just finished my yoga class, so I was feeling rather Zen. Surprised, I backed into the nearest doorway as the riot police passed me. They looked rather hot and fed up. It's quite hard running in all that gear. There was much panting. I asked their leader what was going on. He made a typically French sound that meant something like, "yet more bullshit".

I followed the squad up onto the canal street. They had taken position across the street, riot shields and batons in place, and tear gas at the ready. The reserves were on the bridge over the canal. Facing them were the black clad protestors: anarchists, communists, others. Mostly they were young men ski and gas masked, but there were young women in the crowd and older men. They were well prepared.

My attention was taken by a group kicking in a closed shop's window just yards from me. They easily broke the glass, kicked in more of it, entered the premises and started carrying out the contents. Not looting, just destroying. I saw a young woman smash a computer screen on the pavement, alongside her comrades busy breaking paving slabs into chunks of the right heft to hurl at the police. Rocks, cans, bottles, emergency flares, firecrackers and the like were raining down on the police as the protestors grew more and more defiant. They moved towards them for a face off, shouting slogans all the while.

Then the police opened fire with tear gas rounds. Half a dozen. More. Deafening. And the gas itself is stinging to the eyes and throat. I retreated to the street below the canal. The police advanced. The protesters legged it. Not all of them got away. Two were wrestled to the ground by the police and arrested. More tear gas was fired. The protesters regrouped and the whole thing started again.

I wasn't entirely sure what the tactics of either side were: the protesters wanted to march and have a fight, the police were determined to stop them. No announcements to disperse were made, but then, I didn't stick around long enough to find out how it all ended. After about twenty minutes of photographing the scene, I became concerned I might be caught up in it. I was, after all, dressed in my usual black (leather jacket, legging, t-shirt) and I was wearing my rather clumpy biker boots. An easy confusion might have been made.

Just a few streets away, Saturday afternoon continued as normal: Parisians went on shopping, eating and drinking, peacefully protesting against something in Place de la Republique - this week the vegans calling for the closure of abattoirs - while the Caribbean carnival made its way down Boulevard Beaumarchais. Such different sides of the city, it's hard to reconcile them.

Thailand 2016 Diary Extracts

Birdsong – The last natural things I saw before boarding my plane to Bangkok was the small flock of sparrows which have made terminal 2F at Charles De Gaulle their home. The first natural thing I saw when arriving was a car park black bird with a yellow eye, probably some kind of starling. Birdsong differs by continent; tunes and calls are always a surprise. It is more melodious here than Africa; fluid water warbling with trills. The doves are softer than our wood pigeons. This is my early listening before the chorus is drowned out by traffic and building noise, the children in the school next door, and police whistles. These are imitated by one bird, another screeches over my head as if it is having an orgasm. Bickering birdsong now, as if a hundred market traders are outshouting each other to extol their wares, and orgasma bird is frantic to join them.

Ladyboys – A friend warned me that the sex industry was hard to avoid in Thailand. I wasn’t trying to in Bangkok, but I honestly saw nothing. Admittedly, I did not prowl the Khao San road at night. I spotted one ladyboy in a shopping centre and very beautiful he was too, as was my masseur(se) in Phuket. If this sounds like the writing of a nineteenth century anthropologist, it makes me uncomfortable that I find this subject noteworthy. Not of course, that transgenderism is necessarily anything to do with the sex industry. The massage studio was very clear with its unequivocal sign – No Sex. It saddened me that this was necessary, but obviously, it was.

Traffic jams – On my last evening in Bangkok I was held up in traffic on the motorway from the airport forever, but was actually no more than ten minutes. The King’s motorcade of a more than a dozen vehicles sped past. What is it with me and foreign royalty? It seems that whenever I go away I run into them.

Signage:

Please take out your shoes (Wat In).

We do not like in this bar people involved with drugs.(Khao San road)

Be very careful swimming here. The current is very strong. You might be absorbed by the water drain. (Phuket)

Overhearing:

I don’t know what I am looking at (American tourist)

Hidden London, Kensington

In this occasional series, I write about lesser-known parts of London. This is part of my genteel flaneurist project; genteel that is in comparison with the more gritty stuff of Messrs. Sinclair, Self et al. No traipsing around railway arches and disused public toilets looking for the spot that semi-famous bloke, name drop, name drop, once told me something vaguely interesting, thanks. 

This time: Holland Park and the Leighton House Museum, a few minutes’ walk apart between Holland Park Road and Kensington High Street.

Holland Park is a super place for a walk any time of the year with its patches of woodland and wilderness (blue bells everywhere),  and formal landscaping, such as the rose garden , but especially in spring when the Japanese garden within the garden is at its best.

The Kyoto garden is a smallish pond and stream stroll garden and at the time of my visit was in full bloom with single and double cherries, the acers in fresh leaf of gold, and red.

Run off from falling water:

wood grains for ghost carp

to hide in and scare their prey.

The garden was decorated with huge fish kites billowing open-mouthed, the stones were shiny from that morning’s watering and the snow lanterns shaded from the season. For a good twenty minutes a grey heron eyed up carp much beyond its abilities, giving visitors another free photo opportunity.

There are few Japanese gardens in the UK, and even fewer in London, so for someone like me, who has made her own attempt at such a creation on a tiny plot in Shepherd’s Bush, this was well worth the trip, for additional plant listing purposes and a few precious moments of repose. 

You’d hardly know you were in the city with all the birdsong around, including a demonstrative peacock intent on making himself heard.

The Leighton House Museum, a short walk downhill from the park, was the home of Fredrick, Lord Leighton:  Victorian painter, sculptor and Pre-Raphaelite. It’s famous for its fabulous interiors, the most wonderful of which if the Arab hall, complete with rich blue and turquoise tiles and indoor fountain, its song sadly barely audible over the holiday conversation of the volunteer guides.

The peacock followed me onto the tiling and as an extravagant piece of taxidermy, positioned at the curve of the bannisters, and in various places tail feathers appeared in jars. Clearly my superstitions about these things indoors are not shared by the house’s curators.

Currently on show is a great collection of Pre-Raphaelite works on paper from all the usual suspects. I wondered about the wisdom of ruining a turkey carpet by hanging a portrait on it. More charmingly a class from a girl’s junior school was doing some well-behaved drawing in the theatre.

The garden is huge for this part of town and sports one of Leighton’s snake fighting sculptures. You may know the one in the RA.

Ten pounds well spent, I’d say, and there is nothing tacky in the gift shop, but if you are looking for afternoon tea and cakes, bad luck, you’ll have to wander onto the high street for those. 

Delacroix and the Rise of Modern Art, National Gallery

The National gallery does hang pictures well. Another stunning exhibition in which the canvasses sing from the well-illuminated walls.

A must see for the spring in London if you want to observe his direct influence on the next generation: Cezanne, Reniour, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Odillon Redon and the like, and if you want to see surprising paintings by artists you think you know: a pieta by Van Gogh, huge nude from Cezanne and so on.

Strange that I go to an exhibition of French painting in London, but hey, whatever.

Anslem Kiefer at the Pompidou

Kiefer’s work is always monumental. That’s why one piece of stacked shipping containers, filled with unfurling rolls of photographically imprinted lead, takes up more than a floor’s height in the atrium of the Pompidou. It’s why this show of 150 works goes on for room after room, some containing as few as three canvases, such is the scale.

Wear sensible shoes and don’t expect to be able to sit down very often. This is a marathon, but a very worthwhile one. It’s a huge and impressive survey of his work and certainly bears more than one visit to take it all in. I particularly enjoyed the vast landscapes and architectural paintings, and the installations behind glass.

The early rooms deal with the German past, including the Nazi uniform paintings which first brought him to attention. Later a recurring motif is the snake, which slithers its way from painting to sculpture and back again.

Much here is narrative, including books incorporated in paintings and painted books, and it is fertile ground for letting your imagination run riot. Make up your own stories, while admiring the muscularity of the paint work, even flowers have a thickness and strength that command one’s attention.

Frank Auerbach at Tate Britain

Frank Auerbach is an acquired taste: one that I have yet to sup willingly. I am not exactly fond of his thick layers of paint and the dull palette mixes of sludge and mud. And judging by how quiet this show was on a Saturday afternoon, I am not the only one.

If find the early to mid career work depressing, but he later work is vibrant, and even cheerful, now that he has dispensed with layering and is scraping off paint before reworking.

His London landscapes in different seasons are lovely. The most impressive for me were the charcoal portraits and self-portraits - very resonant.

Go, if he's your cup of expressionism, otherwise he's unlikely to grow on you by means of this show alone.

Hidden Paris - Musee Zadkine

Making good on my promise to visit Paris' less well known museums this year, I started with the Musee Zadkine, housed in his former home,  just a hop, skip and jump from the Luxembourg Gardens in the 6eme.

It is small and perfectly formed, and a lovely way to pass an hour looking at beautifully serene and gentle sculptures.

You can easily see the influence of his friend Modigiliani and later Cubism. It was hard not to reach out and touch the sinuous forms.

Seek out the tranquil green courtyard  and enjoy everything for free. There were only two other people there when I visited. Thank you Paris.