Some random notes to start catching up again:
The pub at the end of the world
There's a canal at the other end of the park near my house. Last week, several housemates and I walked up the canal path to a pub called the Anchor and Hope. The barman looked like he'd been there for years--literally, standing behind the bar for years with no break and perhaps no nourishment except what he pulled from the tap. Pretty much the worse for wear. One in our party wanted a shandy, but he refused to make one. Only beer, he said. After getting our pints and half pints we took a table outside with the rough-looking but genial clientele and the bar dog, who was looking for any new friend to scratch him on the butt. The sun had just set. All was calmer than I'd have expected. Across the canal stretched the Walthamstow Marshes--acres of grasses with feathery heads. Off in the twilight, some buildings poked up like grain elevators. The only activity across the way was the occasional passing of a train. I felt miles away from London, very much like being in the Midwest.
Variations on a theme
Went to the National Portrait Gallery again the other day. In addition to a showing of the annual portrait painting contest, there's an exhibit of one artist's collection of other people's paintings--about 300 of them, all of the same image. He went to flea markets and antique shops, originally thinking he'd collect every copy he could find of da Vinci's Last Supper or some other well-loved image. What he found over time, however, was painting after painting of a 4th century saint named Fabiola. The curator's notes describe her as the patron saint of nurses and protector of abused women. The walls are a hodgepodge of copies. Almost all show a woman in profile, facing left, red cloak on her head. A few turn her around to face right, and some change the color of her cloak. Her face, of course, is at least slightly different in each one. Most are probably in oil, some in acrylic, at least one is seed art. Some are on canvas, some on wood, one on black velvet like those homages to Elvis you find at state fairs and cheap bars back home. Some Fabiolas are huge, most modest in scale, a few are tiny, pieces of jewelry.
It's a fascinating experience to walk into the rooms and see the subtle and at times dramatic variety. Reminded me of a comment earlier about how some painters or sculptors (or actors) seem to recreate the same thing over and over again. Are they trying to get it right, or working out something inward, or is this just what we do? It occurs to me that maybe this exhibit imitated something like an archetype--an image that keeps coming up over and over again, in different parts of the world, in different times. It was also interesting to note in the curator's display that the original painting has been lost, so all we have now are probably copies of copies of a 19th century image of a woman who lived a millennium and a half before that. So it's not at all about what she really looked like, really about how she's been imagined and envisioned by individual artists of varying skill, over and over again. I guess you could say the same of any actor's portrayal of any given character. Or any preacher's take on Jesus or the gospels, for that matter.
Swine flu liturgies
Speaking of church--and no, I didn't even plan that segue--there was a notice in the paper the other day that the Church of England has, because of the swine flu outbreak and for the first time ever, directed its priests to stop using the common cup when celebrating the Eucharist. They didn't even do that during the plague--though Parliament did pass a law back then saying that in cases of necessity, Communion would be considered valid if only the bread or the cup were used (and not both). Interesting that it took an act of Parliament to settle such an issue. But this is the Sovereign Queen (or King) of England's church, after all.
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