I started the morning by going to the Science Museum, but was over an hour too early, so I spent the time getting tickets to the opening night of the Proms (a London concert series) at Royal Albert Hall and hanging out in the (now mostly empty) school building. Finally, the museum opened, and I went through the temporary Titanic exhibit, which had several recent artifacts.
After leaving the museum, I went across the street to the Victoria and Albert Museum, where I looked around the permanent collection and had lunch before going to the Art Deco exhibition. The exhibition itself was interesting, especially since I'm interested in that particular style, but it was very crowded.
I walked back to my room and tried to regain my energy (the heat and humidity left me a bit exhausted) before going to the National Gallery, where I saw the "Private Passion" exhibition (with works from Harvard's Winthrop collection, encompassing 19th century works including many drawings and paintings by Ingres and Moreau's 'Salome,' which I found quite striking) and parts of the regular collection that I had glossed over before. I'd still like to go back to the museum, though.
After the museum closed, I had dinner near Leicester square before going to a performance of Hitchcock Blonde, a new play. I'm sort of mixed about the play itself; though the Hitchcock performance was very good and the play started well, it was a bit overwrought and, well, all too obviously written by a man. But, in any case, it's good to see new plays rather than just restrict oneself to 'museum pieces.'
No comments:
Post a Comment