Tim Minchin and Prejudice

I don't know many people who were born in Northampton, in the UK, but apparently Tim Minchin (who's generally regarded as an Aussie) was.  I'd never heard of him till tonight, but it's not unusual for me to be way behind the eight ball when it comes to catching up with singers and musicians and artists in general.  (I've actually been in Northampton more than once, because I have relatives on my wife's side who live there.  I was actually born in Australia,  so does that makes me a kind of reverse Tim Minchin, a kind of Nihcnim Mit?  And did you know that Tim Minchin is an anagram of Ninth Mimic?)

Enough of that.  Tim Minchin is a talented musician who can play piano and sing. His songs (if the one in the video is anything to go by) are very clever and amusing.   The song has a longish opening that leads you down a completely different track (especially if, as a New Zealander, you've heard about the word Hone Harawira used in Facebook recently) and then it gives you a lovely surprise by turning out to be about something else altogether.  

Great stuff...

Giclée and atelier

I discovered the word, giclée, when I was in Northampton. I checked out an Art shop there, and kept finding the word on all the labels attached to paintings around the shop. Had to ask what it meant and was surprised to discover that these wonderful reproductions were printed on laser printers.
And the same word turned up in the Bedford where we also visited an Art shop (it turned out to be a kind of sister shop to the other one), by which time I was au fait with giclée.
Art works done in this fashion tend to be very pricey: that’s not surprising, as the process of making them is rather more complex than older print approaches. An article on Wikipedia explains how it’s done in more detail than I can comprehend (not really, I just couldn’t be bothered reading it properly), but doesn’t mention another print approach that’s also changing the face of art works. This is called ‘atelier’.
Now the word atelier has long had connections with the art scene, but here it seems to be being used in a different way again. I inquired of the proprietor of the first art shop what they meant by atelier being listed on some of the paintings. She said that they were produced in a similar way to the giclée, but then, to give them the feel of real paintings, the artist or an assitant reproduced the actual texture of the painting, so that real brush strokes appear on the works. This is particularly effective in the work of an artist like Alexander Millar, who does thickly painted pieces centering on ‘gadgies,’ little old men in cloth caps and old suits, and their womenfolk.

Check out the link to Alexander Millar for a number of examples of his amusing and delightful paintings.

Church-going

We’ve been to three different churches since we came to England. Three times to my niece and her husband’s church, where things are pretty lively, and the preaching has been consistently worth hearing. Once to the Park Avenue Methodist Church in Northampton, (pictured) where we attended a fairly traditional service that included a double baptism of twin boys, and communion. The sermon wasn’t up to much that morning, but there was plenty else going on, and the people were friendly.
And this morning to a Baptist Chapel at Whepstead, where there were probably only twenty-five people including children, but where we were greeted enthusiastically, and made very welcome. It was pretty traditional too, compared to the Baptist Church we attend at home, but that was okay. The organist was very good, the singing was full-hearted, and the sermon, from a minister who had recently celebrated fifty years since his ordination, was thoughtful and sound. So much for Christianity being on the wane in the UK. The warm welcomes we’ve received everywhere we’ve been and the sound teaching has confirmed that Jesus is alive and well in this country.