Framedlight

At the end of January Alan and I had a week in Venice. It proved to be the perfect time with very few tourists, and although it was cold it never rained. I had to persuade Alan that he could not take his bike as they are not permitted on the island but he soon discovered that travel by water is good fun. We flew in to Marco Polo airport after an early departure from Gatwick  and caught a bus to Piazzale Roma on the island of Venice, where all motorised land vehicles terminate. Here there is an enormous car park next to the train station. As advised by my guide book we bought a week long season ticket (pretty cheap) for the vaporetto and walked to the Ferrovia water stop to catch our boat down the Grand Canal to San Angelo, the nearest stop for the accommodation we had rented. Here we were to meet a guide to take us to our place. Two students were waiting for us and we all wandered around aimlessly for about 45 minutes until we eventually found the apartment. It was dark by that...

A few pictures from the locale of Tate Modern.

On a visit to Tate Modern I thought it might be fun to do a study of Duchamp's 'Fountain', a piece of 'readymade' sculpture which the Tate quotes as topping a poll of 500 art experts in the UK to be the single most influential piece of art created in the 20th century. I was keen to see what the galleristas at the Tate would make of it, so I sat on a convenient bench for about an hour and photographed the passers by. The work itself was submitted by Duchamp, under the guise of R Mutt (Mott was the maker of the sanitary ware), to the inaugural exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists in New York. A group that Duchamp had himself helped to found. The works submitted by members were supposed to be hung without reservation, but the directors of the society present during the hanging decided to exclude the urinal as not fitting to be shown on the grounds of both art and decency. Duchamp resigned from the society and  retrieved the urinal which was photographe...