Louise Bourgeois: Works on Paper

Tate have done a very though job detailing this excellent exhibition.

http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/display/louise-bourgeois-works-on-paper

http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/display/louise-bourgeois-works-on-paper/wall-text-0

THE FAMILY, 2008 Gouache on paper,

THE STRETCH, 2006 Etching on paper

Robert Mapplethorpe: Artists Room

http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/display/artist-rooms-robert-mapplethorpe-tate-modern

http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/mapplethorpe-self-portrait-ar00225

I’ve never really got Mapplethorpe, so I tried again. I do like his portrait of one my literary heroes William Burroughs.

Tate describes this image: “By 1980, when this photograph was taken, Burroughs was a countercultural giant. Mapplethorpe portrays him as a secular saint in prayer. Almost half the composition is taken up by Burroughs’s dark jacket, which thereby throws into sharp relief his head and clasped hands.”

I am not sure I agree the interpretation Burroughs is praying (or ever did). He looks melancholic with a heavy load pushing down on this bent shoulders and elbow resting on his thighs.

Every time I come to Tate Modern Like to look at the Francis Bacon painting and Alberto Giacometti. Which I did, but I also spent quite a lot of time looking at abstract impressions of water in oil paintings by Turner, Nolde and Kandinsky.