Turner’s in town! Until June 28th the National Art Museum of China is holding a major exhibition of Joseph Mallord William Turner’s works. I have always loved Turner; he is my favourite English painter. Sometimes I think he is the only English painter! Unlike the French, Italians, Spanish or Dutch we don’t have a great number of world renowned artists who paint pictures. Writers in spades but painters are few and far between. I read somewhere this may have something to do with the split in the Christian church. The Roman Catholic Church has traditionally been a great patron of the arts, whilst the Protestants have tended to frown upon visual representations of the bible and have preferred their church walls white and unadorned.
Be that as it may Turner is up there with the greats and I had to check this exhibition out. I made arrangements to meet a friend and her four year old son at the museum entrance. It was beautiful and sunny as I walked down Wangfujing, soaking up the warmth and enjoying thenovelty of being in a pedestrian zone. Unfortunately I had underestimated how far the museum was from the underground station and I knew how easily children get bored if they are kept waiting. However my worries were groundless as the museum staff had thoughtfully provided all the kids with wax crayons. Crayons! In a museum full of priceless paintings! I felt this was a brave if somewhat foolhardy experiment. I had visions of my friend Raquel’s little boy, Walter, scribbling all over a Turner masterpiece. So we decided to play safe andconfiscate the crayons before we went in to see the exhibition. One good thing about going with a child is that they stop you becoming too pompous. If you start getting all arty-farty about a particular painting, holding forth at length about its merits, a small voice will inevitably pipe upwith: “This is boring. I want an ice cream。” Parents have to be experts at blackmail, promising ice cream if the child will just behave for five more minutes. In the end Walter got into it and enjoyed what is an amazing exhibition. There are over 112 major works and you can learn more about Turner from the links on the homepage of this website. If you get a chance, go, you won’t regret it。
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