I was very sad to hear only yesterday of the death of Nicholas Goodison, who has in his many different roles been such a big figure in the arts, as well as the City: as an author of books on barometers and ormolu and, I think, one of the founders of the Furniture History Society; he was one of the small group of people who gave advice on the establishment of the Royal Academy Trust in the early 1980s, was a long-standing chairman of the National Art-Collection Fund, chairman of the Crafts Council and author of the Goodison Review, an admirably wide-ranging report on the functioning and financing of museums with the support of the private sector – and this only scratches the surface of the multiplicity of his public roles. I’m surprised that there isn’t more information about him online (where are the obituaries ?), not least because I have always understood that he more than anyone was responsible for Big Bang, drawing up the regulatory framework when he was chairman of the Stock Exchange which led to the deregulation of the City in 1986, which presumably has done more than anything to change the character and operation of the City and the takeover of old City institutions by the American banks. It’s hard to imagine that anyone in the future could be as prominent both in the City and, at the same time, in the running of the arts.

I see from the paper this morning that North Wales has for the first time overtaken Devon and Cornwall as the most popular holiday destination. Not surprising. It’s obvious from the size of the cars, its proximity to the cities of the north west, the long queues to the beach, and a subtle change in atmosphere from deep 1950s unfashionability to poshness:-

There was mist on the fields tonight after the sun had gone down. A clear night:-

It’s a great relief to be out of London, where there was an increasing sense of cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, there is a premature sense of celebration that the government has somehow beaten the virus through its vaccination programme, so that we can all celebrate Freedom Day and victory at football by abandoning any precautions, including social distancing and the wearing of masks; and, on the other, watching the statistics of rapidly increasing infection, the closure of local shops and restaurants ‘due to unforeseen circumstances’, and the fact that so many people are having to self isolate, particularly those with children at school and university. I suppose it is a calculated risk not to have to remain in any form of lockdown, but it may not be seen to have been such a great idea to those who get Long Covid, who may look back on the jubilation of the Tory backbenchers without quite the same enthusiasm, particularly once we have 100,000 cases a day as predicted.

I came across the attached article online this morning. It is a historically well informed argument, hardly surprising given its author, for the benefits of impoverished museums: more concentration on the art and less on the panoply of treating museums as visitor attractions; and sympathetic to a new generation coming into museums with counter-cultural political interests, upset by the dominance of trustees and the ways they make their fortunes.

https://www.artforum.com/print/202106/the-modest-museum-85771?s=09

We missed the programme about Coventry Cathedral which came out recently, but watched it last night (https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/m000wvm3/coventry-cathedral-building-for-a-new-britain): a rather fascinating reconstruction from documentary footage of the process which led to the construction of a Brave New Cathedral after the destruction of the original from heavy bombing in the early stages of the war (there was German newsreel footage proudly reporting on it at the time). Basil Spence came out of it well, not least for his great generosity in employing so many significant artists, including Jacob Epstein, in spite of the hostility of the committee overseeing the work, and Graham Sutherland, whose east end tapestry is so remarkable. I remember being taken to see a documentary about the construction of the cathedral in the village hall of Pandy in 1962, the year it was consecrated, and the film brought back all the characteristics of democratic post-war optimism, even including Kenneth Clark.

We went to see the Charlotte Perriand exhibition at the Design Museum yesterday:  quite a revelation and a beautifully organised and informative exhibition.  

When she first presented herself to work for Le Corbusier, he said ‘We don’t embroider cushions here’.   She had already designed a necklace out of ball bearings, ‘a symbol of my adherence to the twentieth-century machine age’:-

We liked the kettle in the room she designed in the late 1920s, all very austere and callisthenic:-

And the foldable stackable chair, designed in 1936:-

I wasn’t so convinced by her more organic work from the 1950s, but would definitely like to see Les Arcs. This is her Refuge Tonneau (1938):-

In the intervals of talks about Cedric Morris and the glories of the world’s trees, we explored the parkland at Helmingham – a magical, old established, totally unspoiled, ancient parkland, full of big, old, ancient trees:-

There were distant views of the house:-

Lots of orchids in the wild meadow at Helmingham.

Bee orchids:-

Pyramid orchids:-

Common spotted orchids:-

And white pyramid orchids:-

Helmingham Hall was a spectacularly beautiful setting for the Garden Museum’s annual festival, postponed from last year. An early Tudor moated house recooked by Anthony Salvin in 1840:-

Everything about it was perfect – a compact, well ordered garden, opening out onto a spectacular deer park:-