I sometimes have planned a great many adventures for each day of our travels. But other times John and I improvise a bit. Sometimes those are the best days of all. This was one of them. We have been to most of the major London museums over the years, and we have been to some of them more than once. So at breakfast John asked our hosts Andrew and Richard if they had any recommendations. They suggested that we might want to go to The Wallace Collection and pointed out that it was not far away at all. It was absolutely perfect.
Although I admit that I had never heard of this museum, it turns out is one of the most important art collections in the city. It is named for a certain Richard Wallace, the illegitimate son of some duke or marquis. Despite, or maybe because of, his son’s somewhat irregular social standing, the father decided to give him the entire family art collection and the house near Grosvenor Square. After Richard died his widow, perhaps thinking that philanthropy is best social revenge of all, donate the collection to the Crown. And so was born The Wallace Collection, a superb collection of art and decorative arts.
The paintings in the museum concentrate mostly on the seventeenth through early nineteenth centuries.
Perhaps the most famous piece here is Franz Hal’s Laughing Cavalier.
But as the audioguide pointed out, this is a misleading title and certainly the artist would never have connected it to this painting. Instead, it is probably the portrait of a young groom around the time of his marriage. The rich detail on his silk jacket helps to identify the purpose of the picture.
Almost equally famous, and again not correctly named, is Lady with a Fan by Velasquez. This is probably the portrait of a young French woman at the Spanish court.
One of our favorites is this picture of two young lovers whose fate is describe in the Inferno. Dante, in red, and his guide Virgil, in green, stand on the right reflection gone their fate.
VICTORIA AND ALBERT
After a lot of art and design, we needed a bit of coffee and a sweet in the lovely courtyard restaurant. As we were there, John proposed that we try to see if we could get into the Alexander McQueen exhibit at the Victoria and Albert Museum. I was a trifle skeptical as I had looked at the ticket sales online and seen that it appeared to be sold out until late this month. But I agreed to give it a try.
John was also determined that we would get from the Wallace Collection to the V and A by riding bikes. London has an extensive bike rental system, and I was willing to give it a try. The directions were actually pretty simple.
At the museum, John asked a helpful docent with a strong Irish accent, if there was a chance to get tickets for the McQueen show. She walked us halfway around the museum and put him in a line. John always seems able to get tickets for things that are sold out and his luck did not run out today. He was able to buy to tickets for the four thirty shaw. After getting the tickets, we first wandered around a bit in some of the medieval galleries. John was taken with the needlework on this chasuble.
We knew that there was a tour of the theater collection at two o’clock. We found the tour, led by a very enthusiastic curator. There was a lot of interesting stuff here. John was really delighted with the stage models like this one for Long Day’s Journey into Night.
And this one which looks like it was for some kind of French or Restoration drama. Look closely at the mirror at the back of the set. Do you notice somebody familiar?
OPERA
