On Friday my friend and I went to the Who Do You Think You Are family history fair. This involves a train ride into central London, followed by the underground west to one of London's of exhibition centres, Olympia. This is actually the hall next to the one we were in, but I think it's a nicer-looking building:
We decided to get the bus back to the train station to see if there was anything interesting along the way. We got off at Piccadilly, near a church that has an arty-crafty market in its grounds. (Consecrated 1684, but not one of Christopher Wren's finest.)
Further along Piccadilly is the Royal Academy, where the latest must-see exhibition is housed. Just as we got close to the gates, I did a double-take as I thought the artist himself was walking past us.
Fortunately, reason prevailed, and I realised that (a) it was a bit too young to be David Hockney and (b) he didn't have on his signature outdoor wear of a flat cap. Dead ringer, though, and I suspect not accidentally, especially as I saw another, not quite as good, a bit later on.The exhibition in question is called A Bigger Picture. For a year, Hockney and his assistants travelled around the Yorkshire countryside in a van with nine cameras on top in a 3 x 3 pattern, filming the same views over and over again at different times of day, and in different seasons and weather conditions. He then composed huge nine-part pictures, which adorn the walls of the gallery, and his films, moving seemlessly along, are projected.
I've never really been a Hockney fan, and I loathe his fanatical approach to smoking, but I have to admit that the TV programme I saw about this exhibition really caught my imagination, and if I don't manage to get myself along to see it I will be very disappointed.
4 comments:
I'm having a hard time picturing what you've described but it sounds intriguing.
The "Who Do You Think You Are" Family Fair sounds interesting. Did they have a geneology booth where you could search your family history? I think that stuff is so interesting.
Vikeau, it's a whole lot bigger than that! There are hundreds of stalls and thousands of visitors each day for three days. Organisations have queues for their researchers to use their computers to help people with enquiries, in the hope of signing them up to paying websites. There is also the Mormon organisation Familysearch which is free of charge. Sadly, much of their research comes from finding records of people long dead so that they can baptise them retrospectively, something that has rightly caused much anger recently as they baptise Jewish holocaust victims.
Interestingly enough the Mormons have the largest data base for African Americans--which on the one hand is cool since geneology searches for African Americans are really difficult. On the other hand its a way for the Mormon Church to do exactly as you said. I don't think I want to do that to my "peeps" without their permission. Besides my grandmother was way Catholic--I'd think she'd come back to haunt me if she were re-bapisted as a Mormon. However, it does sound like a fun way to spend a Saturday.
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