Last week was culture week in the Smith household. On Wednesday 11^th, Diana and I went to see Simon Armitage read his poetry and talk to the audience at Wadebridge Library. We wrote it up for the poetry website, Write Out Loud, so I won’t repeat myself. Click on this link to see what it was all about.

Diana with Simon Armitage

On Thursday 12^th, we were invited to a talk by Ges Wallace of Tate St Ives on the relationship between contemporary artist Linder and sculptor Barbara Hepworth – not an entirely random topic as the Tate is currently running an exhibition which it describes as: “The artist Linder brings together a group of her own collages with seven sculptures by Barbara Hepworth.” Ms Wallace enthused about Hepworth but seemed taken aback by how literally Linder’s work seemed to express her ideas. I’m always a bit dubious about art that uses collage and found objects. I remember seeing an exhibition by Sherrie Levine at the Guggenheim in New York three years ago, called After Rodchenko 1-12. The work was described as “appropriation”, seeing as how the twelve pieces were all originally by Rodchenko. At least Levine acknowledged the origin. Linder’s collages used images cut from magazines with no (apparent) attribution to the image creator.

We also saw a video of a new ballet, The Ultimate Form. “Choreographed by Linder and Kenneth Tindall of Northern Ballet, and performed by Northern Ballet, it is based on Hepworth’s monumental sculptural work The Family of Man 1970 and features costumes created by cult fashion designer Pam Hogg and a new score by Stuart McCollum,” as the Tate describes it. It was “slow dance”, but impressive. We had the time to see the skill and power of the dancers – much better than the frenetic jiggling of the professionals’ pieces on Strictly. The costumes were a bit reminiscent of Seventies film sci-fi, though.

This was all provided gratis by Mercedes-Benz South West, who laid on drinks and refreshments as well, with a couple of chefs cooking up a rather good stir-fry and rice on the spot. I think they think we’re good customers…

On Saturday, I played bowls for Wadebridge in a friendly against Lostwithiel. Yes, at the end of my first season I was picked for a team. A list went up a few weeks ago in the clubhouse, I put my name down and was picked. Lostwithiel Bowls Club is outside the town, on the way to Restormel Castle, and has great views down into a valley and up to the hills. It rained on Friday and Sunday, but Saturday was great. My rink (number four of five) won by one shot on the last end, but my lift went (and I with it) before we found out the final score for the match. Next Saturday is the final day of the season, and features an internal match between the President and the Captain. I’m in the President’s team.

Is bowls “culture”? It has its own culture, shall we say, not least the use of handwritten lists on clubhouse notice boards, rather than anything new-fangled electronic, such as email.

Sunday represented the cultural highlight of the week. Diana, Tris (returned from a jaunt to Oxford) and I went down the Regal Cinema in Wadebridge for the evening showing of… Kick Ass 2.