Richard Long's many walks

(Click on the image above to enlarge)

After two friends' recommendations I took the advantage of the past sunny Sunday to check out Richard Long's exhibition at the Tate BRITAIN. Believe me, after 40 min of scuttling along the Thames to reach Tate Modern to find out it's actually at Tate Britain was not fun - but at least the weather was gorgeous. (I'm so sorry Aniko!) He is a landscape artist in the most contemporary sense. In short: Richard Long treks various walks across the world and documents them. His determination in walking the arduous distances alone is admirable. I adored his perspective on the world. Mr. Long has managed to bring out proses of poetry from the simplest beauties nature has to offer.

Initially, Richard documented his walks through hand-drawn maps and photography and later into sculpture and typography. The journey through his exhibition leaves you yearning to travel off the beaten track - and more importantly to notice the little details that are often dwarfed and overlooked by grandiose subjects. The next time I see a river, I'd look for patterns in the pebbles and at the blankets of moss that creep along the riverbanks. I will not bore you in my attempts to replicate his poetry but friends, this is an exhibition not to be missed. It made me realize how most of us no longer walk as much as we've become so dependent on transport and how much we are missing in terms of "travel". That the journey is all the more enjoyable when one doesn't focus on merely reaching the destination but also the little tidbits you could pick up or talk about - to touch and feel along the way.

p.s. It's also worth it to just take a few minutes in the room in the middle of the exhibition where he's covered a whole wall in finger mud painting against black. The little splatters across the bottom where the white paint hits the floor were my favourite bits.

Attached are photos that I have 'stolen' from the exhibition via my iPhone (I don't think my SLR was allowed), photography was prohibited - as if that really ever stopped me anyways :) For those of you that have been to this exhibition, will you please stop leaving your comments through emails and Facebook and leave them HERE on the blog please so we could strike conversations with other lovely and curious people like you.

p.p.s. Stay away from the After Darwin exhibition at the Natural History Museum - it was decidedly one of the worst (and paid for!) exhibitions I've been to EVER. If you've been and loved it, please prove me wrong and I might just feel better having parted with my hard earned £6.

LINKS
Richard Long at the Tate Britain
Richard Long's official site