My OperaFeeling Liverish?
Tuesday, June 30, 2009 8:43:49 AM
Even though a number of the Liverpool clubs proudly advertize that they stay open till 7 am, I didn't make a late night of it Saturday night. So I was feeling fresh and frisky Sunday morning for a little stroll up the hill to the cavernous Anglican Cathedral for morning services. Superlatives abound! It's reputed to be the largest Anglican Cathedral in England, if not the world. Of course, our rather sparse Sunday morning congregation of about 150 people probably could have fit into one of the toilets, but I'm sure the place does fill up on more formal, celebratory occasions.
The place was designed by Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960), the revivalist architect also responsible for the classic English phone booth. Scott won a competition to design the new Cathedral when he was only 22, in 1902; after two world wars, and economic depression, and the fatal collapse of Liverpool's shipping industry, it wasn't until 1978 that the Cathedral was finally completed.
The guest preacher at the Cathedral was an interesting bloke, Andrew White, who is the vicar at St. George's Anglican Church in Baghdad. And has been there since 2003. He had just left Iraq a few days earlier, visiting Merseyside for friends and connections. He seems to have a valuable perspective on a lot of things that have happened there, and a natural gift of communicating his ideas as well. I'm going to have to look out for his book; I had heard that it's worth reading.
Sunday afternoon I museumed down at the Albert Docks, where the Tate has installed a Liverpool outlet in one of the restored warehouse buildings. The area reminded me of similar industrial conversions in 19th century cities elsewhere, like Manchester New Hampshire, or Hamburg Germany. The Tate's does a wonderful job of installing handsome galleries and filling them with choice bits of their unequaled collections. The current main exhibit at Tate Liverpool highlights scultpure and sculptural art.
An Andy Warhol soup can overlooks one of Salvador Dali's lobster phones
A beautiful Barbara Hepworth wooden sculpture, carved and highly polished from a single tree trunk
An intriguing "disco floor sculpture hall," complete with dance floor and individual headsets playing 1970s anthems, intending to suggest that artists who work with the human figure intend their work to be perceived in movement, not static-ly.
I also paid a visit to the International Slavery Museum, which occupies a floor of the Mersey Maritime Museum. It's a great concept, and of course it is important to connect Liverpool with the sordid trade upon which so much of its wealth was based, but I wasn't impressed with some of the exhibits, and thought generally that the musuem attempted to do too much in too small a space. (The museum attempts to show African life and culture, AND the horrors of the middle passage, AND the lives of Africans in their diaspora, up to Lenny Henry and Barack Obama, all on one floor. With not enough resources!
Then, in the evening, after a little nap, I went back to the university neighborhood of Mout Pleasant to a nice little tavern called "The Grapes" which features live Latin Jazz on Sunday nights. It was a blast!
The place was designed by Giles Gilbert Scott (1880-1960), the revivalist architect also responsible for the classic English phone booth. Scott won a competition to design the new Cathedral when he was only 22, in 1902; after two world wars, and economic depression, and the fatal collapse of Liverpool's shipping industry, it wasn't until 1978 that the Cathedral was finally completed.The guest preacher at the Cathedral was an interesting bloke, Andrew White, who is the vicar at St. George's Anglican Church in Baghdad. And has been there since 2003. He had just left Iraq a few days earlier, visiting Merseyside for friends and connections. He seems to have a valuable perspective on a lot of things that have happened there, and a natural gift of communicating his ideas as well. I'm going to have to look out for his book; I had heard that it's worth reading.
Sunday afternoon I museumed down at the Albert Docks, where the Tate has installed a Liverpool outlet in one of the restored warehouse buildings. The area reminded me of similar industrial conversions in 19th century cities elsewhere, like Manchester New Hampshire, or Hamburg Germany. The Tate's does a wonderful job of installing handsome galleries and filling them with choice bits of their unequaled collections. The current main exhibit at Tate Liverpool highlights scultpure and sculptural art. An Andy Warhol soup can overlooks one of Salvador Dali's lobster phones A beautiful Barbara Hepworth wooden sculpture, carved and highly polished from a single tree trunk An intriguing "disco floor sculpture hall," complete with dance floor and individual headsets playing 1970s anthems, intending to suggest that artists who work with the human figure intend their work to be perceived in movement, not static-ly. I also paid a visit to the International Slavery Museum, which occupies a floor of the Mersey Maritime Museum. It's a great concept, and of course it is important to connect Liverpool with the sordid trade upon which so much of its wealth was based, but I wasn't impressed with some of the exhibits, and thought generally that the musuem attempted to do too much in too small a space. (The museum attempts to show African life and culture, AND the horrors of the middle passage, AND the lives of Africans in their diaspora, up to Lenny Henry and Barack Obama, all on one floor. With not enough resources!
Then, in the evening, after a little nap, I went back to the university neighborhood of Mout Pleasant to a nice little tavern called "The Grapes" which features live Latin Jazz on Sunday nights. It was a blast!
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