London Day 3

Another full day. After breakfast we headed to the Tate Modern for the Matisse Cut-Outs exhibit. This was a huge retrospective of the last 13 years of his life. He had been sick and had difficulty painting. He played with some shapes of cut out paper, and found he was fascinated by what he could achieve. His critics complained he couldn't paint any more, so he also did some paintings in a "cut out" motif to prove them wrong. He was unable to stand, so he had an assistant move the shapes a little left, a little right, until it was just so. He worked with pre-painted sheets of paper, with an entire palette of different shades. It was really fascinating to see the output of a genius even at age 82. There had been a cut out exhibit in DC years ago(?1983) but this was much more extensive and complete and had a number of movies of him doing the cutting and directing. Really a great exhibit.
After Matisse, we wandered around the museum. The photographs by Harry Callahan were disappointing at best. Neither of us saw much artistry in many of these photos. We were unmoved. Meh.
Outside it was a glorious sunny day on the Riverwalk by the Thames. A "bubble man" was making giant bubbles and all the kiddies were jumping to pop them. Many of the adults, too. The photos are in my camera, so I have no good way from here to transfer them to blogspot until I get home.
We returned to the Victoria & Albert so Ann could resume gift shopping. I spent the time doing some medical research concerning a patient back home, and emailing with his family.
Back to our hotel for a few minutes to freshen up before we went out again for an early dinner at a different Indian/Punjabi restaurant, Masala Zone. This was ok, as it was more of a chain, so it was more "homogenized". Passable for us, but Paul would object.
We wound our way the The National Theater at the Olivier Stage for "King Lear". First of all, there were 3 different stages and other productions, a la Kennedy Center, but this was all plays. The building was 60's cement modern. Very beautiful in its time, but definitely dated. Inside the theater, the seating was good and the acoustics were passable. Now on to the play: Lear is old and getting senile. He tries to divide his kingdom among his 3 daughters, but the infighting among them and their husbands (and lovers) is fierce. As all the fighting is happening, Lear is going mad. It devolves, as Shakespeare often does, into a killing field. The acting was superb and Lear was outstanding. The woman who played the middle daughter, Regan, was wonderfully deceitful, but her accent made her hard to understand. No matter, the tones of voice gave away what she was scheming!
A small medical adventure during the intermission. As we were exiting the theater, a girl was passed out in the hallway. Of course, I tried to help. "Get me a wet paper towel", but all the bathrooms are "green", with electric hand dryers, and there is not a paper towel to be found! We made do with toilet paper. At least they haven't found a way to eliminate that kind of paper! The girl came around quickly and we continued into the second act.
The cab to the tube took us past Big Ben, which I tried with my cell phone to get a decent picture. You be the judge.


Stephen J. Rockower, MD
Sent from my iPad