PotCVpouri

 The Yarkshire Gamer has announced the end of the golden age of wargames blogs, although I can't help noticing that he did so via a wargames blog. Rest assured that this blog will continue its proud record of publishing top-notch, wargame-related stuff every single day and often even more frequently. And that, dear readers, is an aspiration rather than a promise.

So, I haven't been here for a while; what's been happening in my life? Not wargaming, that's for sure. I think I mentioned that I had bought a pressure washer. I have been dodging the showers and trying it out. I had never done any jet/pressure/power washing before and was interested to discover that it is a metaphor for life itself: everything is a complete mess and at the end you stand back and ask yourself "Is that all I've achieved?". 

On a brighter note, cultural activities have resumed. In my capacity as a man-about-town I was invited to a reception to mark the reopening of the Tetley Gallery in Leeds city centre, a very pleasant Art Deco building which was formerly the offices for the brewery. The current exhibition is by Mel Brimfield and is entitled "From This World, To That Which Is To Come", a quote from "The Pilgrim's Progress". The artist gave a talk, but as she did so whilst wearing a mask I am unable to tell you what she said. The piece above was singing to me whilst I was taking the photo (N.B. this is very different to the idea of it 'speaking to me', which it most certainly did not) and is, I believe, about the concept that our mental and emotional health would be better if we would only all help one another; amen to that. The best piece was a cartoon which suggested that the Adventures of Tintin were the delusions of a psychiatric in-patient, that Professor Calculus was his doctor, and that Snowy was in fact his pillow rather than his dog. All of which makes more sense than the books. 

I have also been to my first gig in over a year, the great Martin Simpson. I have of course seen him many times before, which I think helped to bridge that gap and make it seem like just another concert. Not so for him, I think. It was his first appearance in a long time and he said that it was impossible for him to express what it meant for him to be on stage again, "reminding myself of who I am" as he put it. He played the usual mix of originals, traditional songs and covers, including songs by: John Prine - sadly lost to Covid last year; Dylan - eighty in a couple of days; and this one from Robb Johnson - my old comrade from days gone by.

Cornucopia

This piece, by sculptor Edward Allington, is entitled 'One Unforgiving Moment', which perhaps indicates that the smaller vases result from the breakage of the larger, but for some reason exist as miniaturised replicas; fractals rather than fragments.

Elsewhere in his work Allington differentiates between factory based mass production and large scale craft workshops in which those involved have the opportunity to display pride in their work. Viewing it as a modeller and wargamer it may not be surprising that it made me think of an historical original being reproduced both in miniature and in great number.

Anyway, mention of fractals reminds me of my favourite mathematical joke:

Q: What does the B in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for?
A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot

Pot79pouri

You will all be seriously concerned that I am going to review in great detail the whole of my cultural life during the period of enforced absence from the blog. Happily even I am not that cruel. There were of course many highlights in the 3 operas, 12 plays, 4 gigs and 2 films that I managed to squeeze in because, thankfully, my long vision was unaffected by the spectacles debacle. However, 2001; A Space Odyssey wasn't among them. I'd managed never to see this before so was keen to catch the 50th anniversary restored print on the big screen. Dear, oh, dear; what a load of old rubbish, and I don't exempt Leonard Rossiter's Russian accent from that criticism. Does anyone know why the astronaut doing the EVA flew the small pod further away from the bit he wanted to repair than he was prior to launching it before getting out to spacewalk back? No wonder the AI thought it had a chance of winning.

I shall instead mention a few which actually are worth, er, mentioning:

• The post-Bazza Northern Broadsides' funny and poignant version of 'Hard Times' with all the usual music and dancing.
• Noel Coward's 'Nude With Violin', which demonstrated that the master had a similar view of modern art to me, but also rather disappointingly demonstrated that he couldn't think of any wittier way of expressing it than saying "Anyone could have painted that" over and over again.
• An amateur production of the musical "Sweet Charity" that gave the young(ish) mothers of Ilkley the chance to unleash their inner dance hall hostess, with frankly terrifying results.
• 'Celebration', a Waterhouse and Hall play that not only did I much prefer to 'Billy Liar', but which to anyone like me who grew up in a large extended working class family in the early sixties was as if one's past had come back to life.
• English Touring Opera's very funny take on Puccini's 'Gianni Scicchi'

Boardgaming is also difficult if you can't see (especially given that I can't tell the difference between colours half the time anyway), so mostly I didn't bother. I did however join a few of the erstwhile Ilkley Lads for a game of the new reprint of Medieval. The game was punctuated by one of the players regularly falling asleep before waking up to demand to know what was all that stuff going on with removing map tiles from the board. For those who haven't seen it, removing map tiles from the board is in fact a major part of the game. Despite that - and only partly because I won - this game is highly recommended and is hereby added to Epictetus' list of boardgames that will appeal to wargamers. Another game on that list is Condottiere, which I have previously bigged up here only to find out that it was out of print. Well there is good news as it is being reprinted, including rules for a new 2-player variant. Details - except sadly for the timetable - can be found here.

And no post at this time of year would be complete without one of these;

Through the flashing bars

"Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability." -  Sam Keen  

Which is another way of saying that the painting total for July stands at the magnificent total of not a lot. Following the recent game of To the Strongest! I have colour coded the sabot bases used for Celts and Romans, to make it easier to keep track of which command things are in, but that's it I'm afraid.

Idleness has also extended to the blog, if you will excuse my self indulgence, I would like to catch up with other things that I've seen:

Hamilton Loomis: An intriguing blend of blues, funk, soul and jazz. He included a tribute to Chuck Berry, and his choice of 'No Particular Place to Go' rather suited the louche nature of the rest of the set. Like many performers today he's prone to wandering out into the audience and climbing on chairs while playing; wireless connectivity has a lot to answer for.

Dan Baird and Homemade Sin: Their website claims that they are 'classic hard rock', but actually there are significant country music influences. Baird used to be in the Georgia Satellites, although judging from his on-stage comments the split wasn't exactly amicable. It happened in 1990 so, if I may be so bold as to offer some advice: let it go, mate, let it go. The lead guitarist is the spitting image of Steven Toast, but not only could he really play, but he did a neat trick of swinging his instrument over his shoulder and back around in mid-solo, which I had never seen done before. The support band - the exact identity of whom remain a mystery to me - certainly are classic rock, right down to the haircuts and the loon pants. I'm pretty clear that four of them were at university with me and have been cryogenically frozen ever since in the style of Austin Powers. The drummer is a modern day imposter; perhaps something went wrong during the thawing process.

You know, the more I looked at the bass player the more certain I was that we had once put him up for election as treasurer of the student union without telling him about it; a story for another day.

The Endellion Quartet playing Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert, a soothing change from all those guitars.

The Graduate: Having recently seen a stage production I took the opportunity to catch a 50th anniversary screening of the film, which I had last seen many years ago. I can report that it's much better than the play, with Benjamin being a substantially more sympathetic character, although the tassel twirling did lose something from not being in the flesh, as it were.

The Temperature of Sculpture:  This collection of the work of the late Jiro Takamatsu is, like pretty much every show at the Henry Moore Institute, mostly complete tosh. I did however rather like this:

I've already mentioned one of the month's visitors, but the Casa Epictetus was also graced by the presence of this blog's Luxembourg correspondent. He has responded to last year's referendum result in the only sensible way and become a citizen of the Grand Duchy. Sadly my own search for an Irish ancestor has drawn a blank.

Moscophoros

Unusually for me, I rather like the latest show at the Henry Moore Institute: Votives by Aleksandra Domanović.

The sculptures, made in the tradition of Greek korai, are intended to 'fold the aesthetic of classical sculpture into her investigation into how developing technology relates to the societies that create it'. I'm not entirely sure what that means, but nevertheless I'm going to say that she has achieved it. The pieces manage to be both recognisable in form to those who have visited ancient sites or museum galleries and yet are distinctly of the present day. I must be going soft.

The artist claims that all technology is gendered, but doesn't elaborate. Of the two technologies that she uses I'm going to guess that she thinks 3D printing is female (creating something from nothing) and inkjet printing is male (creating by emission on to a blank canvas), but that might prove nothing more than that I'm both a pseud and a good example of Freud's psychosexual theory of personality; neither of which will come as a surprise to readers of the blog. Still, a modern art exhibition that makes one think something other than "this is a bag of shit" is an event to be cherished.

Kow bisa para Kong!

 As regular readers know it is my custom to go to all the exhibitions at the Henry Moore Institute and then come out and say how bad they are; basically I just don't like modern art. However, credit where credit is due; I should have reported earlier that I have been very much enjoying the magnificent five metre tall gorilla that has been standing outside the building for the last few weeks.

I have now been to see the exhibition of which the beast forms part and and can confirm that virtually all of it is terrible. I must be going soft however because I also quite liked this piece by Nigel Hall, although the photo (taken with the camera which I keep in my manbag for just such occasions) doesn't do it justice (you'll have to take my word for the fact that it appears to float in mid air) and nor can I remember its name.

Going back to King Kong (for it is he, sculpted back in the 1970s by Nicholas Monro), the eighth wonder of the world will be on the Headrow for another month or so; well worth a trip.

By the way, neither of those photos is in black and white, which you can verify by enlarging the first and looking at Kong's eyes; it was just a very grey day in Leeds.

A damn poor mind indeed

For 'fueled' read 'fuelled'. And many thanks to the Big Bouncy Woman (who for various reasons is no longer to be known as the Lady Gardener) for gleefully pointing it out.

A wargaming catch-up: there hasn't been any. When choosing a nice indoor hobby like wargaming I obviously assumed that it would be immune from the weather. However, this winter's storms have played havoc with the timetable and so it was again this week when, coupled with a over-confidently aggressive cat, the wind and rain caused the game to be postponed. That doesn't excuse the lack of painting however; that was a victim of ongoing birthday celebrations. Hopefully it will pick up again this week. My IT Miniatures order has now arrived so there is plenty to go at. I have acquired a cheap, second hand camera - nothing like as good as the one that I lost - so maybe there will be some photos whenever the game does get played.

I've also been to the Henry Moore Institute to see their latest exhibition 'A Lesson in Sculpture with John Latham'. I'd be lying if I said that I liked it, but it did give me much to think about; mainly how much I disliked it.

Those really are three piles of coal

The whole vibe of everything

I'm going to try to avoid abuse for not being sufficiently appreciative of Elkie Brooks by sneaking mention of it in with a load of other stuff. In fact I seem to have also overlooked having seen Gilmore and Roberts recently. I rather liked them, make your own mind up:

The wargaming annexe was unaffected by the floods in Otley. The houses that ended up underwater were those that have a view of the river rather than of the A659 as the Casa Epictetus offers. The weather did disrupt travel somewhat, but nevertheless I made it to Leeds Art Gallery for British Art Show 8, a touring exhibition that takes place once every five years and which hasn't been to Leeds for twenty five years, or a generation as the publicity rather portentously says. Featuring forty two up-and-coming British Artists, it was mostly a load of old pony, with the only piece to which I would have given house room being 'On Nom Ore', a large hand-tufted wool wall hanging by Caroline Achaintre, that was so big that in fact I don't have enough room in my house after all. I chose the particular day that I went partly because it was when certain works were being interpreted in the galleries through the medium of music and dance by local students. This did not make things any better.

An unlikely and serendipitous result from the trip was that one exhibit, Linder's 'Diagram of Love: Marriage of Eyes' (literally a piece of old carpet that the artist found somewhere), made me realise what the device on Hastings' flag was meant to represent. That would be the first Baron Hastings, who has featured in all of my many refights of Tewkesbury and who has caused me every time to think "What on earth is that meant to be?". No doubt you already knew and are mocking me now; so be it.

Which brings us to Elkie Brooks. She was excellent. I can say no more.

Of More Mice And About The Same Number Of Men

I have been taken to task by my elder daughter; a not terribly unusual event to be sure. On this occasion it is regarding mice, specifically those of Mousey Thompson. Having described how I had gone far out into the Dales and seen them for the first time, she pointed out to me that the church of St John the Divine in Menston also has them. Considering that church is about 100 metres from the family home (until 'we were pulled apart because her mom did not agree') she asks, with the know-it-all attitude so common in the young, whether it wouldn't have simply been easier to walk round the corner at some point in the last twenty years. Possibly.

The latest exhibition at the Henry Moore Institute is by the late Paul Neague and I have been along to view it and mock. Like all shows at the HMI - and modern art in general - it left me baffled. Having said that, I found the the largest sculpture on display, Nine Catalytic Stations, to be rather peaceful. I have no idea whether that's what the artist was going for, but that's how it struck me.

You talk like Marlene Dietrich

I have also been to Leeds Civic Hall to see Agatha Christie's courtroom drama 'Witness for the Prosecution' performed in the round in the council chamber. The building was more fascinating than the play (it was obvious who'd done it from the off, the twists were unexpected because they were ludicrous and the actress playing Romaine was too young) and it was the first time that I had seen the ground floor. Opened by George V in the 1930s, it is very different to the 'epitome of Northern bombast' Leeds Town Hall which is eighty or so years older. Also interesting is the display of civic gifts received by Lord Mayors down the years. My eye was caught by that from the mayor of Ulan Bator, a rather fine statuette of a mongol warrior; I bet no one would have predicted the receipt and display of that object when the building was first conceived.





                                       

Pot40pouri

"Surprises are foolish things. The pleasure is not enhanced, and the inconvenience is often considerable." - Jane Austen
  
Our refight of Chotusitz completed - or near enough for everyone's satisfaction - and Frederick won. Having said that, I think it's a very good scenario and the Austrians have a pretty fair chance of winning. To do so, their commander needs to be more sensible with his cavalry on the left than I was and the grenzers who occupy the town need to inflict a bit more damage on the Prussian reinforcements; neither of which is beyond the realms of possibility.

I have been to the latest exhibition at the Henry Moore Institute featuring works by Carol Gove and Carlo Scarpa. It is absolute rubbish. 

I travelled to London last week, my first trip since the reprivatisation of the East Coast Mainline route under the control of Virgin Trains. My return train was cancelled, and I was advised by Virgin that any delay over thirty minutes entitled one to compensation and, this being the case, I duly did. My claim has subsequently been rejected on the basis that, and I only paraphrase slightly, there is nothing to do in Leeds at that time of night anyway so what difference did half an hour make. 

Asparagus has been cooked again, this time with bacon lardons, poached egg and pine nuts

Sin titulo

Ignoring all previous experience I have been to the Henry Moore Institute to see their latest exhibition: Line as Object by the Venezuelan artist Gego. It is not really my cup of tea, but the galleries of 'negative space' did actually provide an interesting half an hour, so not a complete wasted journey. The Claude Cahun photographic exhibition in Leeds Art Gallery is worth a look as well.

Drawing without paper

The Punic Wars campaign ended with a whimper. It was like a high jump competition where everyone has cleared the same height and the medals have to be decided by some arcane countback mechanism. The decision went in favour of the Carthaginians so congratulations to Peter. This has to be the longest campaign that I've ever played in and I had mixed feelings. I enjoyed both the strategic side and the tabletop games - especially when we switched to straight out of the box C&C - but the two aspects didn't mesh for me.

And finally a quick picture of your bloggist on top of Haw Pike. For the avoidance of doubt that isn't my magic hat.

Tooth House

I have been to the Henry Moore Institute to see their latest exhibition 'Ian Kiaer: Tooth House'. I can already hear you asking the obvious question and believe me I have asked it of myself a number of times. Why? I clearly don't like modern art and yet every time they have a new show off I go to stand there aghast thinking 'God this is pants' (honourable exception for Robert Filliou). And indeed this one is. Pants that is. Don't bother.

Much better

The title of the exhibition and of some of its exhibits comes from the work of the surrealist architect Frederick John Kiesler. (For the record, I have no idea whether the title of some of the other exhibits really does come from either the book by Dumas père or the Alain Delon film, but finding a link between 'a frame stretching six metres high, only just capable of holding its own weight' and anything much is a bit of a challenge.) Anyway, I suspect most wargamers have probably never heard of Kiesler, but when you look more closely I would suggest that many of us have certain traits in common with him. One of his colleagues at Columbia University was quoted as saying: "If Kiesler wants to hold two pieces of wood together, he pretends he's never heard of nails or screws. He tests the tensile strengths of various metal alloys, experiments with different methods and shapes, and after six months comes up with a very expensive device that holds two pieces of wood together almost as well as a screw".

 

I couple of weeks ago I had to admit to never having read 'Of Mice and Men'. However, I have read 'Tortilla Flat' (recommended - essentially a reworking of the legends of King Arthur with the knights of the round table becoming a group of indigent Californians). In order to demonstrate that this blog isn't simply just thrown together, the above photo shows Hedy Lamarr starring alongside Spencer Tracy in the film version. The pulchritudinous Ms Lamarr was Kiesler's niece.

Browning is back! Hello! Hello!

I have been to the new exhibition at the Henry Moore Institute and it is, to use the argot of the professional art critic, pants. The premise of the show, entitled 'Indifferent Matter' is to 'explore how objects resist and are coerced into becoming sculptures' and it does this by including a load of old rubbish - literally in the case of a lump of asphalt, which Robert Smithson wittily named 'Asphalt Lump' when he picked it up from the waste around a steel mill in 1969 and claimed it was a sculpture because he said it was.

That isn't to say that there isn't some nice stuff. There is a Warhol piece 'Silver Clouds' which, if deconstructed could be dismissed as simply some helium filled balloons being blown about by a fan, but which, in place, is actually rather splendid. The best pieces are some exquisite 4,000 year old jade discs from China. They are here because no-one knows their original use, but their effect, far from supporting the exhibition curator's hypothesis, is instead to highlight the importance of craftsmanship. For me the futility of the whole thing is exemplified by the eoliths on display. They are meant to pose the philosophical question as to how there importance has changed now it is known that they are natural rather than man made. Now I, self-evidently, do like a philosophical question, but not one of those for which the answer is bleedin' obvious. They clearly do not now have any importance, except as a minor, minor footnote in the history of how science sometimes gets things wrong.

So why do exhibitions like this get put on? In the words of the Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney whose death has been announced today (1).

'Now, you're supposed to be
An educated man, '
I hear him say. 'Puzzle me
The right answer to that one.'

And on the subject of bad science, this is interesting.

I also attended a lecture on the subject of the Cyclops through the ages, starting - reasonably enough - with Homer and moving via Harryhausen to Spongebob Squarepants. Fascinating.

(1) except of course for the Prometheus in Aspic blog, which announced it some years ago

Loose Windscreen

And so to the cinema. It was perhaps fitting after the great man's disappointing failure to emerge from the helicopter last week that I should go to see 'Springsteen & I'. I had assumed that it was showing in Leeds because Bruce is opening the new Leeds Arena on Wednesday, but actually it was showing everywhere on the same day. I don't have a ticket for the concert, which is made easier to bear by the fact that they were £75 each.

Anyway, the film consists of interwoven concert footage and fan tributes and rather good it is too. One rather striking element is the astonishing cultural divide between the Boss's European and US fans. One set - you must see the film to find out which - are (mostly) staggeringly pretentious whereas the other lot are somewhat more human and self-deprecating. As a clue just let me say that the British audience that I saw it with laughed at one type of fan and laughed with the other. The biggest idiot was, as it happens, a Canadian; possibly combining the worst of both worlds.

The picture above obviously has nothing to do with Bruce Springsteen, but I thought I'd include it before David 'Posho' Cameron's internet police make posting it a criminal offence.

 И, товарищи, я могу только сказать, что вы поступили правильно, когда вы выполнили вашу королевскую семью. Мы должны сделать то же самое.

We are a crusade or we are nothing

After a brief hiatus to allow James not to win the prize for best display game at Triples, wargaming resumed in his legendary salon des jeux last night. Peter had at some point thrown in the towel on the Punic Wars game that we had been in the middle of; probably wisely as it was looking to be a foregone conclusion. So it was the 1st Crusade and a chance to play another of the sets of rules that James and Peter have developed based on Brent Oman's Field of Battle, itself a development of Bob Jones' Piquet.

Peter Jackson and James Roach

The various rules, covering the Punic Wars, the Crusades and the Italian Wars (there is a fourth covering ancient galley warfare, but I have never played those - hint, hint) are all understandably similar, but also sufficiently different that even James frankly often has no bloody idea what is going on and has to resort to reading them. Among the largest differences is that relating to the death or otherwise of one's commanders, but it's just a question of mechanics; they still die with distressing regularity.

Anyway, James took lots of photos and will no doubt post an episode in the Muppet chronicles. For now suffice it to say that despite having three absolutely, stonkingly good commanders and continually rolling high to deny the infidels the chance to rally, that the defenders of the holy city are making a right pig's ear of it - or whatever the halal equivalent is.

Looking good

Anything can happen Thursday

Well! So soon after last night's lop-sided lunacy we have another first: two blog postings on the same day. "Blimey O'Reilly" as Oscar Wilde would have said under the same circumstances. 

I have been to the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds to see the new Robert Filliou exhibition. It's centrepiece (not literally as it is actually off in a side room) is 'Eins.Un.One...', a work dating from 1984.

This consists - and I quote - 'of 16,000 wooden dice bearing the number one on all sides, negating the laws of probability'.

Now, any wargamer will tell you that rolling 16,000 consecutive ones is in fact not just plausible, but has actually happened to them during a game in which their brilliant strategy was otherwise going to guarantee victory.

So I, on behalf of you all, want to say to Filliou (again not literally as he has been dead for 25 years): "We recognise and share your pain."

Whaam!

Is Epictetus the Andrew Ridgley of wargaming? Discuss.

Alternatively read his review of the Roy Lichtenstein exhibition at the Tate Modern.

It looks just as good when viewed sober

I have always liked Lichtenstein's work - possibly influenced by the fact that one of his most famous works (above) was reproduced on the wall of the students union bar at the University of Bradford in the mid seventies. The exhibition itself is very good and covers a wide range of styles as well as the classic comic influenced pop art. He was less successful (in my completely amateur opinion) is his more abstract works, although his version of Mondrian is substantially better than the original, which hangs elsewhere in Tate Modern. His take on cubism is also rather good, but in this case serves mainly to highlight the genius of Braque and Picasso. Anyway, I highly recommend the show.

'The ring always believes the finger lives for it' - Malcom de Chazal

The rest of Tate Modern (apart from the building, which is magnificent) merely reinforced my prejudice against most modern art. The rather small cubist section was good and I found myself unexpectedly rather attracted to a couple of the abstract expressionist paintings; although not, I hasten to add, to the Jackson Pollocks - which are basically a load of Jackson Pollocks.

Actually I quite like Wham! as well as Whaam! (Waake Me Up Before You Go Go, Laast Christmas, Caareless Whisper etc). I grew up near where they did and whilst some unkind souls have compared me to the less talented of the two (the Rhetorical Pedant here points out "It was you, it was you.") my more famous namesake has more in common with George being, er, bearded and Greek. If he was alive today I have no doubt that he would be preparing pithy epigrams on his right to park where he wanted, when he wanted, having smoked whatever seemed a good idea at the time.

As a sop to wargamers (although even the most hard line must accept some relevance in this post) I will finish on a picture of two typical wargamers on their way to a show.