Wynmelvin » National Gallery http://blog.wynmelvin.com [ the blog ] Sat, 06 Aug 2011 10:15:48 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9 en hourly 1 November 1st, 2009 http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/november-1st-2009/ http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/november-1st-2009/#comments Sun, 01 Nov 2009 20:21:14 +0000 Russell http://blog.wynmelvin.com/?p=801 LONDON — This morning was wet. The weather is supposed to be clear and dry tomorrow but rain is expected to return on Tuesday. I went to the Natural History Museum this morning and arrived in the rain to discover that they were very busy and that I could expect to be in the queue for up to two hours. As it transpired I only need to wait in the queue and the rain and the occasional gust of wind for about twenty minutes.

Once inside I went and had a look at one of the ticketed special exhibitions: the Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer of the Year. All of the photographs on display were beautiful and many were exceptional.
Returning to the entrance hall I joined the the queue for the dinosaur gallery—I couldn’t leave without visiting the dinosaurs again. This queue moved slower and so took longer, but after about forty minutes I was renewing my acquaintance with the dinosaurs.

I went back to the National Gallery specifically to enquire about their print on demand service—could you take one home with you or did you have to wait for it to arrive by post? As it turned out it is printed there and then depending on how many are in the queue. So I bought my print and was able to see it being printed out on the A0 printer.

]]> http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/november-1st-2009/feed/ 0 October 30th, 2009 http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-30th-2009/ http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-30th-2009/#comments Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:50:00 +0000 Russell http://blog.wynmelvin.com/?p=794 LONDON — Today I went to the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square. I had visited the Gallery on my previous trip to London and enjoyed it so much I just had to return for another look. And it didn’t disappoint. I still can’t get over how bright and vibrant the colours in the paintings are, especially those from the 15th and 16th centuries, when compared to what you see reproduced in books. And the other thing you don’t appreciate from the books are the relative sizes of the paintings. Some are tiny, and others are simply enormous. There is nothing like seeing the original paintings.

There were many memorable paintings but the one that really caught my eye was Two Tax Gatherers by Marinus van Reymerswaele, painted in about 1540. It reminded me of modern illustrations created with vector graphics programs. It impressed me so much I think I might go back and purchase a print.

For the rest of the afternoon I went shopping.

]]> http://blog.wynmelvin.com/2009/11/october-30th-2009/feed/ 1