‘OMG, it’s bright!’ I winced and rummaged around in the bag for a pair of shades as the early evening sunshine whacked my retinas unexpectedly.
Oh yeah, it’s the summer solstice, isn’t it? No wonder it stayed so bright until so late…
A balmy summer evening on Piccadilly…
At Royal Academy of Arts, I was to rendezvous with my gorgeous girlfriends, Fei & Nicky, so we could enjoy A Midsummer Night’s Fête together. At the main gate, I was given a ticket for one free drink and looked for Fei & Nicky who were supposed to be amongst the lined crowd…
Thanks to our iPhones, we managed to locate each other. A group photo with glasses in our hands…
The British summer evening at its best. Mellow & balmy…
The upstairs galleries were a venue for the 246th Summer Exhibition…
In the first gallery, we were greeted by the artwork “Cake Man” by Yinka Shonibare…
The figure, bearing a tower of cakes precariously stuck up on its back, was a representation of greedy bankers in the City and Wall Street, a description by the artist explained.
The next space accommodated large-scale paintings…
This work was my favourite, BTW…
The gallery also housed a bar which served gin & tonic as well as Pimms. At the end of the room, there was a stage for live music too…
A typical scene of the Summer Exhibition at RA. The walls were covered with artworks in all shapes & sizes…
Some works were romantic & dreamy…
while others were rather dark and scary…
Is this how Jerry sees a cheese grate? Oversized utensils in the middle of the gallery…
Unfortunately, I was rather underwhelmed by James Turrell’s light sculpture. The venue had too much ambient lighting which dulled the intensity of the colours. What a shame…
A figure of a young girl with her eyes closed stood demurely in the corner of one gallery…
The work reminded me porcelain dolls by Lladró. The profile was delicate and sensual which made me want to stoke it (but I didn’t, of course)…
The last room was the smallest and the most intimate space and Fei, Nicky & I unanimously agreed that it was our most favourite…
The all four walls were adorned with small artworks, resembling a Victorian reception room proudly decorated by a fabulously eccentric old lady…
Two unicorns in the wood. We all adored this painting / sculpture…
From this photo, the work looks like a conventional painting but it is in fact a 3-D! It was so romantic! We sighed and then, we mused that it would be wonderful if we could hole ourselves up in a sitting room like this with a bottle of good wine & a box of chocolate. All night long, we would discuss about each one of artworks and it would be such fun!
Amongst the visitors, there were also a few performance artists roaming around the exhibition.
This ghost-like artist scared me the most…
He carried a pink column like object with him and was shuffling around the galleries quietly.
He stopped time to time, asking visitors to scribble on the column…
This lady with enormous paper hat was chatting with spectators and handing out lollipop-like paper object…
I wasn’t sure what this gentleman was up to…
When we came out of the building eventually, the party in the courtyard was already in full swing – a band, bottles of bubblies, cupcakes & pork pies…
The hands of my wristwatch indicated that the time was nearly nine o’clock. No wonder we were so hungry…
So we headed towards Chinatown eagerly, salivating over the thought of soup dumplings at Dumpling Legend…
