in a gallery with Miguel Flores-Vianna

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One can be instructed in society, One is inspired only in solitude. Goethe

A glimpse into the photography of Miguel Flores-Vianna takes Us on a journey-to observe -oft times we are asked to come quietly. In my experience- photographers are reluctant to "explain" there work and there's a reason. The beauty of photographs-or paintings is multitudinous-
but along with their Beauty we as observers are asked to see for ourselves.

 MVF in Berlin

True solitude is a din of birdsong, seething leaves, whirling colors, 
or a clamor of tracks in the snow. Edward Hoagland

 MVF in Sweden

The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's. Shelley

MFV in Marseilles

I haven't delved into these photographs of Miguel's with him-but  I see Beauty-and I see a reverence for Solitude. I believe we can never know ourselves without knowing Solitude-some might call it Isolation-whatever it is-it is required. An invitation to have Miguel share some of his work-or observations, it's no surprise he preferred to introduce little augury to English painter. After looking at the paintings of one Algernon Newton-I immediately see their Beauty and see what Miguel saw in them-and what he sees in his Lens.

Here is Miguel's story of  how he saw Algernon Newton.
Observe.




I have been spending a lot of time by myself in a small cottage in Sussex. Although I am an hour train ride away from Central London, the cottage feels as far away from anything urban as I could possibly imagine. Once a week I overnight in London, mainly to see friends. Early last December I was on one of those weekly visits having lunch with a chum at a restaurant off Piccadilly. I had agreed to go with her after lunch to Bond Street around the corner,to pick up a gift-although I was of two minds about it: I wanted to get back to Sussex before the commuting crowd invaded all trains bound out of town.

"C'mon, I will drive to Waterloo Station afterwards," she enticed me.

It was only after three in the afternoon, but daylight was almost gone when we left the restaurant. Walking to the shop, I got an inner confirmation that I have become a country bumpkin. I was entranced by the lights of the shops, the street Christmas decorations, all the passerbys wrapped in cashmere and furs. I simply could not believe my eyes and I was charmed! 

Once on Bond Street, because the street is so narrow, the explosion of all those visual stimulants was potentiated by the hundreds. It was as though I had never been to a big city before. I made my poor friend stop at almost every shop window, my excuse to look at the merch, but mainly to see the lights and people inside, this country bumpkin did not want to miss a beat. 
And that is how I came across Algernon Newton.

His name was on a gallery poster announcing an exhibition. 
Have you ever heard of him? I didn't have a clue who he was either, but something in that poster made me say, as we walked by, "Let's go in."

I have never heard of the gallery before either - which, now, makes me feel ashamed, later you will see why.

First things first: the name Algernon. 
I had only come across it in literature - Wilde, Fleming, but had never met or heard of a living person actually called Algernon so I was intrigued. And of course, I had never heard of Algernon Newton (1880-1968). As we climbed the stairs to the gallery's second floor to see the exhibit, I was still sparkly eyed by all the outside stimulation and was not prepared for what I was about to discover. I have always been a fan of the work of the Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershoi (1864 - 1916), the master of those muted, haunted Nordic interiors. Hammershoi was the first person that came to mind when I first set my eyes on the canvases by Newton exposed in the gallery. His vision, like Hammershoi's, is of the everyday life, what we see all the time and do not notice, of the silent moment, of the anonymous. But unlike his Danish counterpart, Newton's world is far larger, they are not rooms, but cityscapes and "vedute" of the country side, but just as devoid of the noise of human life, eerily subsisting as if on air, still air. 
I was captivated.

The quiet in the gallery dimmed my Christmas fizz and I found that looking at his work was centering. I won't say more about it, I am not an expert and to continue would bring out my personal views more than I would like. But I would ask you to see what else you can find about my new friend Algernon as I think he has real talent. 

Later I did some research and I found out that the name Algernon means "one who wears a mustache", it first appears in France at the beginning of the first millennium: a lonely name I presume as, at that time, the French did not like facial hair on themselves . And how appropriate for the creator of my new favourite canvases as they are such a mirror of loneliness.

And, yes the gallery... Daniel Katz Gallery.  
I asked friends about it and everybody rhapsodized about its namesake owner, mainly a sculpture dealer, one of the majors in the world who, surprise, amongst other achievements, made Hammershoi fashionable in London. (text by Miguel FLores-Vianna)

Obvious- Newton had great admiration for Canaletto, and was often referred to as the "Canaletto of the canals." For all his personal disappointments-you must read of those on your own-his brush caresses even the most somber of scenes-not so much a lonely artist-rather an artist observing his world alone-in Solitude.

 MFV

Miguel observes his world with the same acute eye-no mere passerby-much as Canaletto and Newton did- one where man overlooks what the artist must forever contemplate.




LINKS:

Miguel FLores-Vianna Photography

MVF's New Old World

Daniel Katz Gallery
13 Old Bond Street
London W1S 4SX

The Telegraph on Algernon Newton at the Daniel Katz Gallery here
The paintings of Algernon Newton  here & here



(all works by Miguel Flores-Vianna and images of the Algernon Newton paintings courtesy of Miguel FLores-Vianna)



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