Bombay Sapphire gin and Sydney artist Sam Whiteside (director of Soft Centre), will for five weeks, take over The Clock Hotel on Crown Street, Sydney. Why? Because with Covid on the decline there, they can, but also, they wanted to put on a never-before-seen audio-visual art installation, to be paired with cocktail masterclasses and cinematic, live sound performances across multiple nights. From 15 October, the countdown’s on! See the flyer below.
If you’ve been down – and who hasn’t – then, prepared to be brought well-and-truly all the way back up, thanks to a new initiative in London. The Philharmonia Orchestra from London’s Southbank Centre is, this season, bringing out programme for October and November 2020: six online performances in two strands, encompassing live-streamed concerts, pre-recorded performances and radio broadcasts, as the Orchestra continues to build out its new digital performance schedule. Called Philharmonia Sessions, they’re putting on a series of critically acclaimed free, pre-recorded digital performances, conceived and created especially for an online audience! It’ll continue with two new releases, following three films this summer that have reached six-figure audiences in the UK and around the world, and drawn critical acclaim. The next Philharmonia Sessions feature Principal Conductor & Artistic Advisor Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting Beethoven’s ballet score, The Creatures of Prometheus (24 November), in a dramatic format filmed at Battersea Arts Centre with Stephen Fry narrating a new script by Gerard McBurney. The project is adapted from the programme that Salonen would have opened with for the Philharmonia’s 2020/21 London Season. Jakub Hr?ša and cellist Alisa Weilerstein follow on 5 November, in an all-Dvo?ák programme featuring his Rondo and Silent Woods for cello and orchestra. Both Philharmonia Sessions will be premiered, free-to-view, on the Philharmonia’s YouTube channel. There’s more, too. Scroll on for the full listing or find more at the Philharmonia Orchestra website. LIVE STREAM: SANTTU-MATIAS ROUVALI – AMERICAN DREAMSMonday 26 October 2020, 7.30pm Santtu-Matias Rouvali – conductor COPLAND Appalachian SpringSTEVE REICH Music for Pieces of WoodPRICE Dances in the CanebrakesSTRAVINSKY Dumbarton Oaks Live streamed from Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall, and then available on-demand. Streamed… Read More
The National Gallery London first announced the display of some work by the famed Italian female artist, Artemisia back in 2019 and now, she’s back again. At a time when female artists were not easily accepted, Artemisia Gentileschi was exceptional. Her career spanned more than 40 years and she gained fame and admiration across Europe, counting leading rulers among her patrons. She was the first woman to gain membership to the artists’ academy in Florence. Although Artemisia was greatly admired during her lifetime, she was essentially rediscovered in the 20th century. Certain elements of her biography – particularly her rape as a young woman and the torture she endured during the trial that followed – have sometimes overshadowed discussions about her artistic achievements, but today she is recognised as one of the most gifted painters of the Italian Baroque period. Her art and life continue to inspire novels, films, documentaries, musical and theatrical productions. The earliest work in the exhibition will be her first signed and dated work, Susannah and the Elders (1610, Kunstsammlungen Graf von Schönborn, Pommersfelden) painted when she was just 17. Artemisia returned to this subject throughout her career, approaching its story afresh with each retelling, and her last-known painting, of the same subject, dating from 42 years later, will also be included in the exhibition (Susannah and the Elders, 1652, Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna, Collezioni della Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna). Arranged chronologically and complete with supporting texts, documents and other gathered works, the exhibition is not one to miss. Book in advance at the… Read More
The Australian Chamber Orchestra will return to the concert hall for the first time in six months to present ‘ACO Transfigured’, a limited week-long season performed in front of a live audience. It’ll be socially distanced and take to the stage at Sydney’s City Recital Hall from 5-11 September 2020. The Covid pandemic hit the orchestra in a way they couldn’t have predicted, with artistic director Richard Tognetti having retooled and found himself increasingly behind the camera, working to present an innovative and engaging digital season for audiences around the world. “We have been waiting for this moment since March and are thrilled to be able to share our music with a live audience once again. The COVID-19 pandemic compelled us and orchestras around the world to find new ways to bring music to a world in lockdown. ACO is a national orchestra and although we are grateful that current restrictions allow us to reunite with our audience in Sydney, we will continue to develop and expand our digital offering to reach our audiences across the country and overseas, until we can begin touring again,” he said. The orchestra will perform among other pieces, Mendelssohn’s beloved String Quartet in D major Op.44 No.1 arranged for strings, and Schoenberg’s masterpiece, Verklärte Nacht (‘Transfigured Night’), which will bring the one hour concert with no interval to an exquisite close. See more at the ACO website Tickets start from $59 and will go on sale to ACO Donors and Subscribers 10am Thursday 27 August and to the general public 9am Friday 28… Read More
If Monarchy is your thing and taking a peek behind the walls of how they live is on your list of UK ‘must dos’, then get excited, because the Royal Collection Trust has some good news. The official residences of Her Majesty The Queen will reopen to the public from Thursday 23 July! After the good news about the UKs reversing of lockdown was released, the RCT has been ready to go with throwing open the doors to some prized locations, like: Windsor Castle the Palace of Holyroodhouse the Royal Mews at Buckingham Palace, and The Queen’s Galleries in London and Edinburgh You’ll need to wear masks and adhere to the Covid-19 rules as you peruse collections, peek behind doors and enjoy exhibitions, like: George IV: Art & Spectacle, which explores the life and collecting of arguably the most magnificent, and certainly the most flamboyant of British monarchs. Masterpieces from Buckingham Palace, 11 December 2020 – February 2022, which brings together some of the most important paintings in the Royal Collection from the Picture Gallery at Buckingham Palace. As well as Japan: Courts and Culture, originally due to open in June 2020, is now expected to open in Spring 2022 For more of what’s on and to buy tickets to the spaces, visit the RCT website here from 8 July.
From Saturday 4 July, Kew Gardens’ world-famous glasshouses will open their doors once more and welcome visitors to step inside and explore the botanical treasures hidden within. Highlights include the Palm House, Temperate House, Waterlily House and the Princess of Wales Conservatory. Even The Hive will open; the one famous for its recreation of life inside a beehive. Limited routes and one-way systems will be in operation, of course, but you’ll still enjoy woodland walks and spectacular meadows at their best this time of year. For more, head to the Kew Gardens’ website. Images courtesy, RBG Kew.
The National Gallery of London is one of the first galleries opening its doors again after the Covid-19 pandemic from 8 July. Most establishments won’t reopen, except the Royal Academy’s plans on Tuesday, reopening from 9 July, with face masks compulsory. The Barbican gallery will open on 13 July while the Tate’s four venues won’t reopen their doors until 27 July. All this comes with the new need to register for tickets prior to a visit – yes, to free exhibits, as well – in addition to an enforced one-way direction and face masks recommended. Either way you look at it, it’s a blessing the galleries will reopen, especially the National Gallery, whose Titian exhibition will be available for guests to see after it was cut short by government lock down rules. Head to the National Gallery’s website to book a slot.
From 13 July, you’ll be able to return to London’s most central arts and entertainment precinct, the Barbican! From then, its Art Gallery and Conservatory will be open, followed by The Curve on Tuesday 11 August 2020. In line with government guidelines, new safety measures will be in place including operating at reduced capacity, timed entry slots to ensure a safe flow of visitors through the space, and tickets needing to be booked online at barbican.org.uk in advance of a visit. The reopening programme includes critically acclaimed exhibition Masculinities: Liberation through Photography; epic new installation A Countervailing Theory by artist Toyin Ojih Odutola; and the chance to explore the Barbican Conservatory. See more at the Barbican website and plan your visit! Usual safety measures are in place when the Barbican reopens will include social distancing, limited visitor capacity, one-way routes through the building, sanitisation points and regular cleaning.
If there is a bright side to the pandemic, it would be the fact that old-fashioned drive-in cinemas are back on the radar. With traditional movie cinemas closing their doors during the height of the pandemic, we saw a resurgence of fun in the form of pop-up drive-in cinemas in the strangest places, such as airport tarmacs. Yes, you read correctly. Vilnius International Airport in Lithuania put their empty space to good use and turned it into a film lovers dream by installing a drive-in cinema. Genius! Closer to home in Sydney, there’s the Mov’in Car drive-in cinema on the rooftop of the Entertainment Quarter (EQ) car park. The initiative has proved to be so popular, it will now continue to operate through to the end of July. Coming up in July are some old classics like Finding Nemo, The Devil Wears Prada, The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Slumdog Millionaire. For those seeking something more recent, there’s the blockbuster, Parasite, Birds of Prey, Knives Out and the highly entertaining, Bohemian Rhapsody. You can have pizzas delivered to your car, as well as wine, beers, popcorn and lollies. And as the nights get even cooler over winter, you can enjoy a mulled wine pack while you snuggle under your warm doona, watching your favourite movie on the big screen. Bring up to 5 people in a car and enjoy a retro outdoor movie experience or enjoy a Peugeot Class Date Night in a new model Peugeot. Included in Date Night are two complimentary glasses of… Read More
Taking a curated look at the collection of one of the world’s greatest galleries is now free and easier than ever – because, you can do it from your living room. In a major new digital program, the Gallery is publishing videos here whereby art curators, professionals and experts take fans and would-be visitors through some of the world’s most beloved works. Now, you can join Dr. Francesca Whitlum-Cooper, the Gallery’s Associate Curator of Paintings 1600-1800, who talks about paintings from the Gallery’s collection that celebrate domestic activities such as playing music and card games. Among the works Dr Whitlum-Cooper discusses are Chardin’s The House of Cards, Manet’s Eva Gonzalès, Degas’s Combing the Hair (‘La Coiffure’) and Vermeer’s Young Woman Standing at a Virginal. But that’s not where it ends. As many people under lockdown are finding comfort in nature around their homes and in their gardens, another upcoming episode in the series looks at three expansive rural landscapes in the collection that take us from morning to night. As well as Rubens’s A View of Het Steen in the Early Morning and Corot’s The Four Times of Day; Night this talk includes that most treasured evocation of the British countryside, Constable’s The Hay Wain. A series of online tutorials on ‘slow looking’ develops the Gallery’s mindfulness programme by showing online visitors how to look at pictures in depth and explore hidden details. The first of these asks us to take a closer, slower look at Turner’s Rain Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway. It’s a great new digital age that means our favourite… Read More
