In between Constable & Turner, I went to the National Gallery.
It's ages since I spent so much time at the National Gallery. I started at the Sainsbury wing, which had a major rehand last year. And it got off to a great start with a huge Richard Long mud painting at the top of the stairs. Not the renaissance masterpiece I might have expected, but a masterpiece nonetheless.
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I spent a long time in the presence of da Vinci's Madonna of the Rocks - my all-time favourite [visual] artwork, which was on loan somewhere last time I dropped by.
The large number of pictures on display, and the quality is of course phenomenal. I spent several hours exploring the National Gallery, just following my eyes: seeing what I want to see.
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Rooms full of Rembrandt and Caravagio; Botticelli and Filippo Lippi. And a surprising number of Constables and Turners: two of Turners most fanous painting, The Fighting Temeraire and Rain, Steam and Speed, were hung with some large Constables.
Some amazing art.
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Patrick Hadfield