Erasmus Review

Looking back at the experience of being in Madrid last term it feels almost unreal. It seems like such a self-contained bubble, almost like a dream.

I’m really glad that I did it as I learnt many things about myself.

It boosted my confidence in several ways. I realised that I was able to transplant myself to an entirely new environment (without any language) and within say 6 weeks to create a life for myself, a pretty good life. I’m proud of the way that I figured out what things worked well for me and what didn’t and put right the things that I needed to in order to make myself happy (particularly finding a good place to live and meeting people my age).

Learning a language again (after almost 20 years!) was really enjoyable. I really relished thinking about how Spanish works and learning it was kind of straight-forward (if time consuming!) and learning the logic was really quite satisfying. Learning 'Art' is so different from learning something academic - much harder because it's such an opening up of oneself. It was quite nice to have the simplicity of learning a language.

But finding myself unable to communicate was a real shock, and very difficult. It was naive to think we could turn up without speaking Spanish and it would be OK. Although in hindsight the experience was probably quite valuable. Using language to ‘fit in’ (ie: to joke with people, to ask questions and find out how things are meant to be, and to explain myself) is something that I have relied heavily on in my life (fitting in has always been very important to me). Finding myself unable to do this felt both crippling and yet immensely liberating.

To my surprise a part of me loved being able to be separate, and observe rather than always be at the front line of participation. I really enjoyed being different and having a great excuse (“lo siento, soy inglese”) not to have to do things the way they were expected to be done. I won’t pretend that it wasn’t hard (being told I was going to fail because I was doing it all wrong, was particularly unpleasant). But I think that it was probably the first time in my life that I’ve really strongly felt that actually it didn’t matter if someone didn’t like what I did, since I didn’t agree with their system of value judgement.

I’m not sure right now quite what an impact the experience has had on my art. Maybe it’s too soon to judge.

The traditional and highly structured nature of the education system there was so alien to how I have learnt to work, and the daily experience of living in a new place and learning a language was so all-absorbing, that I found it impossible to make my own work. I feel anxious starting back at Camberwell that I have nothing tangible to show from the experience (well other the blog I guess – and actually that is something). The drawings that I did there I hate, and the mural painting isn’t something that I feel I have any ownership or pride in as it became just a copying exercise. I have my log book which is really a collection of the things I did and people that I met, and some early ideas.

I feel very unsettled being back (not having been in college between June until January is a long time away), and suspect it will take a while to find my feet again, and settle back into my flat, my life and college. I enjoyed the sense of space that I had in Madrid (never having any plans and living in a much more spontaneous way than I do in London) and want to try to hold onto some of that attitude now I’m back.

While I don’t yet know exactly what work I want to make there are some things that feel important at the moment to me:

• Greater commitment to making work (create more space in my life for it, and being braver!).
• Stop worrying about whether it’s ‘good’ or ‘bad’ and make what I feel like making, and celebrate the joy of making things.
• Stop worrying about ‘Painting’ and what being a ‘real artist’ means but make the kind of work that I love and find interesting (eg: Cornelia Parker, Francis Alys, Sherri Hay).
• See what it's like making collaborative work (not necessarily with other artists but maybe with people outside of the art world), maybe using the skills that I have that other people may not have (eg: working with teams of people).
• Explore the sense of lost-ness and confusion that often haunts me through making work about it.

I have this urge to make a Dolls House (interesting reflection of home, of domesticity, of organising things, at this point in time). I feel that it’s important just to go with that impulse and see what comes from it.

Likewise I think I’ll also write to London Underground and see if I can go and visit the Lost & Found department and see what comes of that.

I think perhaps Madrid showed me that even though it’s bloody daunting, good things can come of just jumping in at the deep end and seeing what happens. I suspect this could also be helpful in making work.

I do hope so.

Week 11

So I’m on the plane on the way home. Which feels very strange. It’s exciting. It’s sad. It’s a little scary.

I’ve felt quite peculiar this last week in Madrid. A little unsure with what to do with myself. Ready to go home, but not wanting to leave.

I booked myself onto a ‘tourist tour’ for Wednesday. A guided coach trip to Toledo, Escorial & Valley of the Fallen. But when I arrived in the morning, they said that as I was the only person who’d booked onto that combination, I had to do a different one. VERY annoying!

So I did the full day at Toledo. It was good. It’s a beautiful medieval & gothic city and nice to have a guide to walk you around the city and tell stories about the history. The cathedral was wonderful. And the El Grecos were amazing. Especially The Burial of the Count of Orgaz And the cloisters at the Monasterio de San Juan de la Reyes were beautiful. I’m really glad to have gone.

The rest of the group were funny. A couple of Italians but mostly Americans and an Australian family. My favourite quote of the day was:

“That’s the problem when you come to Europe, there’s so much art everywhere”.

Very astute… perhaps that IS our problem. Too much bloody art.

A nice American called Patrick who’s a chemistry professor at Philidelphia University (over here to do a lecture) latched onto me and we spent the day together and talked quite a lot about the connections between art and science, and about travel and American politics. But some of the other Americans were far too full on for me. They just loved to talk and talk and talk! Telling you stuff about themselves that’s bizarrely personal and without being asked anything (“let me tell you a story… I might cry when I tell it - I usually do, but don’t worry it’s just the menopause” !!?!). We went for this awful tourist lunch included in the tour (chicken and chips and ice-cream with tinned fruit! And musicians dressed in C17th outfits singing Mexican-style Spanish songs – it was actually quite funny it was so bad!). I found I really couldn’t be bothered with the very dull americans’ conversations, and so was really quite rude and just phased them out… I just looked out of the window and wandered off on my own whenever possible. Was kind of fun not giving a shit what they thought of me as I realised I’ll never (please god!) see you again!

I was very sorry not to have seen the Valley of the Fallen though and really regret not having made time to do it before.

The rest of the time I’ve spent wandering around. I FINALLY managed to get to the Prado (hurrah!!) and went to see the new extension that’s just opened and is showing a wonderful collection of Goya drawings (the show is called El Toro Mariposa – The Butterfly Bull), and the new collection of C19th Spanish paintings – a bit sentimental for me but quite fun – especially the giant dramatic history paintings full of castles and kings and troubled virgins).

I also went to see the Marin photography show at the Telefonica Tower. They’re 1901 to 1940 (he was a madrileno photo-journalist) and a brilliant collection. From early flying and motorbike races, to the Spanish aristocracy in the 1910s, to political rallies and then the civil war. Some amazing photos from the 1930s of the main plazas in Madrid covered in huge pictures of Lenin and the hammer and sickle to show support for the Russian Revolution (when the Republic were in power) to the shelling and bombings of streets you can still recognise today in the civil war (and snipers holding out in the area where the university now is). And some brilliant photos of Franco’s troops finally entering Madrid and everyone doing the fascist salute.

Having seen it I kept noticing references to Franco on buildings and plaques around the city. The new law I think means that these will have to be taken down (or covered over) so I don’t know how long they will be around for. The one at Moncloa for example (above the huge entrance to the airforce headquarters) says: “Francisco Franco, Caudillo de Espana, MCMLIV”.

I’ve felt very unsociable this week. Tired and really just wanting to hide under my duvet. I think it’s because I know I’m leaving. I’ve worked hard to make some connections with people here, but it has been hard work. And although I’ve made some tentative friendships I guess I know that in reality they probably finish here, and that’s both sad and a relief. Sad because for me places are very much associated with people, but a relief because it IS hard work being with people you don’t know well. It takes a lot of effort. Sally is perhaps the exception – someone that I hope I will stay in touch with.

I had a nice last Spanish lesson with Feli. She invited me to a concert (Alvaro’s band – Health Control). But I didn’t get back from Toledo until late, and just didn’t feel like going. No need to, but I guess I do also feel a little disappointed in myself for not going (I feel that I should have really). It feels like it would have been another memory to ‘bank’. But that thought depresses me. In a way it all feels a little meaningless – just going through life trying to ‘bank’ memories. This feeling has haunted me this week. What is it all for? Why come and do things like living in Madrid? What’s it for? To be able to tell your children in years to come that you ‘did’ it? To collect up memories and experiences? I’ve clearly been a bit depressed as I can’t help thinking that it’s all quite meaningless. That you try your best to fill your days with doing stuff and then you die! It all feels a bit pointless. I know that travel is supposed to broaden your mind (and I’m sure it does!) but what is one meant to do with a broad mind? Think more? Think bigger? Am still not sure what the point of that is!

I think to be honest I feel a bit lost and a bit anxious about coming back. I’m not sure really what I’ve ‘achieved’ by being here (other than having survived it and had some fun times!) and I’m nervous about what people will expect from me. Should my drawing be really good? Should I be able to speak fluent Spanish? Should I have some incredible ideas for amazing art I should be gagging to do when I get back to Camberwell? Should I be full of entertaining stories of my exploits?

I guess I’ve really enjoyed being in a bit of a bubble here. I’ve liked being ‘different’ and even though it’s been hard, there’s something really quite pleasant about not being understood and not understanding what’s being said. It allows you to stand apart and just watch. It lets you be quite passive and see what happens rather than taking control of situations. To my surprise there is a part of me that really enjoys that (as well as the part of me that I’m familiar with that finds it impossible!). And I’m not sure how the new parts of me that I’ve discovered will work back in London.

Last night was a funny farewell. I sent an email and some texts to invite people out for a drink to say goodbye, but disappointingly a lot of the people who I thought would come (Jolie, Antony, Max, Nathan, Nicole) didn’t even respond. I was surprised and a bit annoyed as I’ve made a lot of effort with them. But maybe it’s hard for them having us here for only a short amount of time. Perhaps saying goodbye is too uncomfortable. Sarah, Matt & Feli were all having to work late so couldn’t come but I had a nice gentle evening in the Pepe Botello (in plaza dos mayo) with Antonio, Johannes and Sally (who came for a quick drink in between her MBA studying!).

Perhaps it was a fitting end. Johannes and I stayed out talking a lot about the experience of being in a strange new city (he has found it very hard and had decided to go back to Sweden, but has now changed his mind and is staying for the year). It was a nice reflective conversation.

Antonio was great and gave me some of his stickers (prints of his drawings) which he sticks in public places (a form of grafitti). He’s asked me to sticker them in London and take photos for him of them in-situ. I’m excited about it. I think maybe it’s a nice way to re-engage with London and make connections between the two cities. Antonio’s drawings are all graphic style visuals of everyday Madrid life (on the tube, in the supermercado, in bars etc) and I think it’ll be fun to find appropriate sites for them in similar places in London. A nice mini-project.

I had my final café con leche at Café Commercial this morning. Fernando was so lovely. Very warm and sad to see me go. He gave me a huge hug when I said goodbye. I bought him a guide book to Londres as he’s coming with his family in the spring and he promised to call me when they come over. He is a wonderful man. The café has been in his family for 4 generations (over 100 years) and he trained as a lawyer before realising that he needed to run the family business (to keep it in the family). He wants to be the last generation (doesn’t want the life of a café owner for his daughter – too much work he says. The place is open 20 hours a day!!!). He wouldn’t let me pay today and said how sad he was that I was leaving. I think that making friends with him and being known there (and teased!) has been one of the real highlights of my trip. I’m proud of myself for having decided it would be ‘my place’ and making it happen for me.

Despite my reservations I am excited about being back in London. About seeing my friends and Rups, about being back in my flat, about having all the things that I’ve missed so much while I was away (art, music, theatre, interesting food!).

There’s lots I’ll miss about Madrid and some things I won’t (!) and despite my depressed thoughts about pointlessness, since you DO have to fill your days before you die, it’s been a pretty amazing way to spend 3 months, and I am SO very very glad that I’ve done it.

Things I’ll miss about Madrid:

• Breakfast at Café Commercial & Fernando
• Sunshine and blue skies everyday
• Café con leche
• Watching the news on TeleMadrid (full of disasters – fires, car crashes, floods, hospitals – you don’t need to know Spanish to understand!)
• Walking around the city every day
• Donuts & churros
• The clean empty metro
• Vino Tinto & canas
• Sitting outside the cafeteria in the sun for lunch at college
• The pride that people have in their jobs (waiters, street cleaners etc)
• Spanish lessons at Feli’s flat
• Anatomia (Pedro going “asi, asi, asi” as he draws)
• Being in a bubble!
• Sally, Matt, Antony, Feli
• Acietunas
• Being different
• Walking in the middle of the little streets because there’s no cars
• Going out late (took a while to get used to but I love it).
• Doing my blog
• Spontaneous social life
• Buskers on the metro (the drummers at Tribunal & the saxophonist at Plaza Espana)
• Churches everywhere
• Flags everywhere
• People wandering around the streets in the evenings.
• Shopping 6-9pm.
• Food markets (like La Paz in Serrano)
• Tarta de manzana
• Zumo de naranja
• Pimientos de guernica
• The balconies & shutters in my flat
• Having time and space to yourself
• A real mixture of ages of people in bars
• Knowing how far I am from home by the red Telefonica tower clock.
• Being so self-sufficient
• People being so kind and generous with their time.
• Mi companeros espanol en las classes
• Lots of hanging around (having lots of breaks)
• Sense of history and tradition
• Plazas (sense of space they give to a city)
• Tiendas de Articulos Religiosa
• Palmaritas
• Diez viajes targetas por el metro
• The worn wooden stairs and iron banisters up to my flat
• Marble table tops
• Old ladies in fur coats with sunglasses and small dogs.
• Emma laughing at me

Things I won’t miss so much

• Everyone smoking (and smoking everywhere!) so your clothes and hair always smell of it.
• Jamon (no more please!!!)
• Dog poo
• Jolie grumpy in pintura mural
• Having to work so hard with people you don’t know
• Mangey cats all around the university
• Having your personality limited by the extent of your vocabulary
• Being told I’m “wrong” all the time.
• Going to the airport (all the time!!)
• Spending € like they’re going out of fashion
• Not knowing where anything cool is happening!
• Mobile phone bill (October’s bill was £595!! Haven’t seen the others yet)
• Long distance relationship
• The faff of paying for stuff (asking for what you want from the counter and being given a ticket to take to the cash desk! Or having to show ID, AND put in pin and then sign.
• Everything shutting 2-5pm.
• Being so tired.
• Not being understood.
• Trying to manage Jordans long distance.
• Waiting for the 46 bus at Moncloa.
• People acting as statues outside the Palacio Real.
• Beggars prostrating themselves outside churches (‘praying’ to you to help them).
• Having to put so much effort into the simplest things!
• Being the one to organise stuff.
• The crazy concierge lady at my apartment.

Weeks 9 & 10

Unfortunately week’s nine and ten have had to be conflated because I came down with such terrible flu at the beginning of this week that I couldn’t write a syllable. Looking back over two weeks is quite hard (it’s amazing how quickly you forget things!) but then quite a lot has been going on.

I’m really enjoying my Spanish lessons with Feli. She’s really cool and funny. Last week we were doing ‘Me gusta’ (“I like…”) including “me gusta muchiiiiiiiiiiiiiisimo” and “me no gusta nada”. She had found us a very cool Manu Chao video on You Tube of his “me gusta tu” song for us to translate as practice. For homework we had to write about things we like and don’t like. It’s so bizarre to have such a limited vocabulary and yet still try to say something interesting! You inevitably sound like a 7 year old writing about their school holidays:

“Me Gusta…” by Jess Blandford aged 34 and three quarters.

A mi me gusta muchos cosas. Me gusta mucho el campo pero prefiero viivir en la ciudad por que me gusta muchisimo el cine, las galerias, el teatro y salir por las noches con mis amigos.

Me gusta la comida. Me gusta mucho los mercados y los restaurantes pero no me gusta cocinar. Pero tengo suerta, a mi novio le gusta muchisimo cocinar (y el lo hace muy bien!)

A mi me gusta leer. Me gusta mucho las novellas y prefiero las novellas modernas (pero me gusta mucho la literatura del siglo XIX tambien). No me gusta nada la literatura de siencia ficcion. Ahora estoy leyendo un libro llamado ‘La Renuente Fundamentalista’. Esta muy muy bien, y tengo solo viente paginas hasta el final.

Tambien con Julie Andrews en ‘El Sonido de Musica’ me gusta el gatito con bigotes, las copos de nieve, y los paquetes de papel marrones envueltos con cuerda. Estos es unos de mi cosas favoritas.”

I got so into it (sat in the corner of café commercial) making myself laugh out loud translating with my dictionary ‘kittens with whiskers’ and ‘brown paper packages tied up with string’ as I thought it would make my teacher chuckle, only to have her correct my grammar and look at me very strangely as if I was some kind of fetishist. She was completely baffled at my rendition of ‘these are a few of my favourite things’ (Emma just held her head in her hands with embarrassment at how uncool I am!). Apparently the Sound of Music has yet to reach Spain and my enthusiasm for it as “a brilliant film – it’s all about these Nuns and Nazis in the Swiss mountains” didn’t seem to convince Feli. However having searched high and low I have found a copy of it on DVD and will do my bit for anglo-iberian understanding by giving it to her as a goodbye Christmas present.

Emma and I had a long chat with Mariano de Blas which was fun. He’s a bit crazy. He never asks really how we are or what we’ve been up to, but just talks and talks. But he was really interesting about the civil war and the Franco regime here and the role of Britain in Spain’s decision to stay out of the war rather than join Hitler. He talked about finishing school in the late 1970s (Franco only died in 1975) and travelling to Europe and America in the 1980s and being overwhelmed by the differences to Spain and the openness of other countries. It is amazing to think that really only 30 years ago there was a fascist dictator running this country right in the heart of Western Europe, and just how controlled things were. Of course no-one in the older generation speaks English because it wasn’t taught at all (Franco was obsessed about making Spain self-sufficient and not being ‘polluted’ by outside influences).

I’ve just finished reading ‘Winter in Madrid’ which is set here in the second world war (but is very much about the impact of the civil war and the early years of Franco’s regime). It really brings to life the sense of fear, the immense losses (on both sides), the terrible poverty and lack of basic things (like food!) that people suffered, and more than anything the brutality and absolutism of the control that was imposed. Control, both in terms of the military dictatorship and the strongly imposed ‘National Catholicism’ of the church.

It is interesting to observe the ambivalent attitude to control here. How highly controlled some things are, like our art classes; lunchtime on the dot of 2pm; the way people always correct you if you say something incorrectly (“it’s important that you get it right”); the conformity of people’s clothes; the predictability of the food etc. In many ways the culture is very unadventurous.

And yet there are also lots of examples of how important the concept of liberty is to the culture: never being able to make plans in advance (“how can I know what I want to do next Wednesday?”); the graffiti on the streets; the passionate demonstrations against having CCTV; the big gay community; the fact that prostitution is legal (I saw an article describing Madrid as “the brothel of Europe” – there are apparently more prostitutes here than in any other city in Europe – despite (or maybe because?!) Catholicism is so strong).

It feels to an outsider like a confusing set of contradictions, but talking to Mariano and reading this book, it did make me think differently about the legacy of having lived under a dictator for 40 years. Of course in that culture a sense of control (and the black and white concepts of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’) is going to be something that is deeply ingrained in your national psyche. And yet equally concepts of liberty and freedoms will be passionately defended because they aren’t yet taken for granted in the way that we automatically assume. It creates a really interesting tension and movement between the two. Plus having had such a recent and bloody civil war where it wasn’t possible to stay neutral, you had to be on one side or another. Red or Fascist. Both were so extreme and such terrible atrocities were done by each. It must be very traumatic, and it’s hard to imagine killing your own countrymen for the future of your nation. Our civil war was so long ago. It’s no wonder such strong notions of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ remain in Spain.


Last week was finally the end of the cereals project I’ve been working on while out here. Much cause for celebration (and relief I have to confess – it’s been hard switching between the two worlds). The new packaging was loved and Chris and I are very pleased to have all our hard work result in something so satisfyingly tangible and real. Can’t wait to see it on shelves across the UK next year!

I did have a bit of a full on marketing day last week. Firstly finishing off the project, and then Kate asked me to lunch to talk about Special K for a project she’s working on, and then that night Sally asked me to meet up with her in a bar to give her a hand on her marketing assignment for her MBA (Swatch case study!). There really is no escape from the world of consumerism!!

Talking of consumerism I went for a lovely dinner at Matt & Katy’s new flat. Ha!! Ha!! I’ve never seen anything like it!! It is amazing. It’s the top floor of this gorgeous building with a giant onion dome overlooking the park, It is stunning! The entrance hall is a riot of coloured tiles, the art deco lift is wonderful and the flat itself is enormous with balconies from every room. It has two separate roof terraces, gorgeous old glass in the windows and radiators cast with 1920s flower patterns on them. But of course with an immaculately modern kitchen, several bathrooms, and all the furniture uber-chic and white. I was so excited by the time I got to the flat that all attempts at coolness disappeared and I just jumped around insisting on a full and instant guided tour. They got the appartment by out-bidding an Italian model. Very funny. I think they were amused by my excitement at their good fortune! We had a really nice chatty evening.

Emma and I bunked classes one afternoon to do a gallery tour. It was nice wandering and discovering more of the commercial galleries here, but we didn’t see much exciting work. It does all feel very traditional. Mostly painting and photography. Some nice things but it did all feel like the kind of thing that I’ve seen before. Nothing that felt very exciting or surprising.

The most surprising thing I’ve done in the last couple of weeks was going to La Solea. I persuaded Emma and Jolie to come with me (and then took Matt, Sarah & Rups there again). It’s a small place in La Latina where the ‘afficionados de flamenco’ are supposed to hang out. I read about it in a book where it said “’visitors’ are welcome but you may find it a bit intimidating… after a few drinks though you’ll be fine”. I’m glad I had read that otherwise I think I may have abandoned the plan at the door. You walk in past the bar and into a smallish room covered in patterned tiles with a bench all around the wall and tables and some stools. In one corner were two guys playing guitar. We ordered drinks and were taken to a table right next to the musicians. It was intimidating. There’s a really hushed atmosphere there – you are here to listen to the music, and we felt very self-conscious at first being the only non-spanish (and pretty much the only women in the place) and not really knowing what to expect. The guys playing guitars were amazingly talented (the speed of their fingers was incredible) and the group around them were doing complicated clapping rhythms. Then a variety of men took it in turns to sing. Flamenco song is such an odd sound. It’s kind of Moorish with a haunting wailing nature to it, but then sung with such strength that at times it’s almost like shouting.

The place got fuller and fuller and smokier and smokier and the people around us got chattier and chattier. The musicians were really friendly so when ‘Pisaca’ (“muy famosa cantanta”) arrived we were introduced and he kissed each of our hands and said he was “ un veridad Madrid gypsie” with a wink and a cheeky smile. He had a drum box that he sat on and drummed with his hands on it. I chatted (in Spanish!) to one of the musicians’ girlfriend (she works on the perfume counter at El Corte Ingles) who was laughing about the fact the place is always full of old men. And it certainly was. All wanting to take their turn singing. It was like karaoke really I suppose. We stayed until about 3am and then squeezed ourselves out of the packed room.

Anna came for her birthday weekend, which was really lovely. Great to see her and chat lots and laugh lots. I still can’t believe she’s actually climbed Everest (well to base camp) – she was full of lots of good stories about it. We had a really nice disorganised weekend – bit of shopping, lots of walking, eating and drinking. We found a funny bar on Calle Libertad where a couple of musicians were playing. One with a very bizarre beard and some unfortunate facial expressions which kept us giggling. Anna introduced me to churros con chocolate and Tinto de Verano (she having worked in Seville for a summer) both of which are excellent additions to the repertoire! We did try to go to the Prado but the queue was about 500 people. I still haven’t managed to go in 3 months (shameful!!).

But on Monday morning – having stuck Anna in a taxi at 5.30am (!) to get to work by 9.30am, I started feeling really poorly. I was really quite ill for 2 days with a temperature of 103 and not really able to do anything other than sleep. I was completely floored by it. It was really quite scary being on your own and being so out of it. Mum kept phoning to check on me, and on the Wednesday, when the fever had subsided a bit, I called in Emma to prevent me from going doollally from isolation, and she brought me soup and fruit and we watched a rubbish DVD together (Dream Girls – it was pants!). It was really sad to feel that I sort of missed out on a week of my time here by being so poorly. I had so many plans of the things I wanted to do before I leave and I don’t now have time to do them all. But I guess that my body needed me to stop.

Fortunately I was feeling much better when Matt & Sarah arrived for the weekend, and then the following morning Rups too (haven’t seen him for a month!). We had a big goodbye lunch with Emma as she headed back to the UK. I am so glad that we came together and really don’t think I wouldn’t have coped so well here if she hadn’t been here too as my little buddy to share frustrations and laugh at the idiotic things we’ve seen or done.

Friday night we went to a restaurant called ‘Lay Down Rest Club’ where you take your shoes off and lounge around on these giant beds (it’s a kind of roman decadent feel) while you eat your dinner (it’s like the Bed Supper Club in Bangkok). Everything was white but with different coloured lights that change through the evening. They had these very bizarre singers who kept coming out and doing cheesy euro-trash pop songs over a backing track. With every song their outfits got more extraordinary. My favourite was the backless all in one leotard with high heels and a large piece of gauze on their fronts attached at their wrists and ankles. They were clearly home-made, very odd, and somewhat hampered their performance (which I’m sure had been practiced with hairbrushes in front of their bedroom mirror). It had an excellent wanna-be Eurovision feel to it. Classy!

While Rups stayed at home studying hard for his GMAT, Matt & Sarah kindly came with me on the cablecar from Arguelles out to the Casa de Campo. It was also comedy bad! It takes you out over the dual carriage-way, over several 1960s housing estates and up over the rather scrappy Casa de Campo. There’s not really even a good view of the city!! When you get up to the top, there is literally nothing there. Just a sad looking picnic area and then a panoramic viewing spot. It was brilliant. It has a series of photos of ‘the view’ with arrows pointing out the landmarks. The brilliant thing was though that the view you were supposed to be looking at was in most cases impossible to see because there were either trees and bushes in the way, or in one wonderful case they had built a concrete shed right in front of the view. So presumably you just looked at the pictures in order to know what the view would be like the other side of this monstrosity!

I was most delighted by the crap-ness of this attraction. For some reason I think there’s something really heart-warming about rubbish tourist things (like the lawn mower museum just outside York!). I love the pride in something so random, and the celebration of such ordinariness really tickles me. Matt and Sarah were very game and let me take some really dull photos before we headed back.

Last night Rups and I went to the ‘Futbol’ we went to watch Atletico win 1-0 against Getafe) in the Primera Division de La Liga. It was fab. Atletico de Madrid (set up in 1903 as an offshoot of Atletico Bilboa) is the shabbier less successful Madrid club (think Manchester City versus Man United). ‘Atleti’ play downtown in Piramides at El Stadio de Calderon de Vincente and have the reputation (as I’m sure always accompanies the less rich club!) of being the team associated with working class Madrid and with more passionate supporters. Not having been to see Real I can’t compare but there was certainly an abundance of passion last night. Although it was a mini-derby as both teams are from Madrid, there were really only ‘los indios’ fans there (Atletico is known as ‘the indians’ – apparently for fighting the ‘los blancos’ which is Real’s colours!). The chanting, singing, drumming, whistling and of course shouting created a brilliant atmosphere and I wore my newly purchased Atletico hat with pride!

The game was hallarious, non-stop giving of cards by the referee. FOUR players were sent off (including the Getafe goalie!!) so by the end of the game they were playing 9 men each. It felt like we were going to end up watching a 5-a-side match! And of course, every time a Getafe player fouled everyone was on their feet full of outrage for the misdemeanour, and every time an Atletico player was shown a card, everyone was on their feet shouting at the injustice of the decision. It was great fun! One of the great things was the variety of people there. Los Colchoneros fans (‘the mattress makers’ so nicknamed because apparently the first red and white kit’s were made from the offcuts from mattress material because they were cheap!) were a real mixture of old and young, men and women, and lots of kids. And the place was full – not what you’d get at 7pm on a Sunday night in England.

I’d love to talk you through the details of the game (!?!) but you may not be surprised that I’ve decided to pass that honour over to Mr Macdonald from goal.com. I just feel that he perhaps has a finer grasp of the detail than I could offer. Take it away Ewan…

“In a wildly eventful game at the Vicente Calderon, Atletico Madrid ran out 1-0 winners over near-neighbours Getafe...the scoreline tells only a tiny percentage of the story.

Indeed, this derby of sorts erupted into fireworks more vivid than anyone could have imagined: near misses, goalline clearances, outfield players in goal, seven minutes of stoppage time and, above all, cards of both colours.

And lots of them, too. Including the six that resulted in second bookings, fourteen yellow cards were produced, resulting in three sendings-off. There was even a direct red for good measure.

Amidst it all, Atletico scored the only goal of the game.

The hosts started brightly both at the front and the back; Forlan and Aguero were linking up well at one end, while Raul Garcia reacted quickly to snuff out what could have been a killer cross from Manu to Granero.

It may be a distant second or even third in the list of Madrid area derbies, but there was certainly no shortage of passion and excitement in these early stages and, sure enough, a goal wasn't long in coming.

Two minutes after the ominous first booking for Licht, Simao charged down the left wing before sliding a near post cross for Forlan to nip ahead of his marker and finish.

But then came the onslaught from the visitors. Albin spurned an absolute tremendous chance as Pablo was played onside to spray the ball across goalmouth. With the Italian 'keeper nowhere, the young forward inexplicably fired wide.

Signs of nerves appeared in the Atleti back line, not least among Antonio Lopez, but at the other end Pernia almost doubled Atleti's advantage with a shot off the post.

The midfield battle was no less intense; Maniche picked up a booking for a reckless, above-knee-height tackle on Cata Diaz before the incensed defender earned a yellow card of his own for a foul on Aguero.

The indomitable Maxi tested Pato once more before the half ended, but the first period closed with Geta clearly in the ascendancy as Manu was played through to test the nervous-looking Abbiati.

On came Belenguer for Mario as the second half began with the similar, frenetic pace of the first.

The best chance of the game came almost immediately, Granero stinging Abbiati's fingertips with a high drive. The Italian 'keeper could only parry it as far as his own goal-line before having to race back to scoop first that ball, and then a header from Albin off the line.

Seconds later, Kun Aguero embarked on a rather ambitious dive that earned him not a penalty but a yellow card as Pato Abbondanzieri failed to make the required contact

And as Getafe's dominance continued, they seemed to be en route for a comeback as Kun then picked up a red card, this time for a needless handball in the box.

But before they could even take advantage of their numerical superiority, it was ten aside: Licht picked up his second booking for a challenge on Maxi almost identical to his first.

After six minutes of end-to-end punts, Pato Abbondanzieri - still on an adrenaline high from the Kun Aguero diving incident - then picked up a red card.

He'd already been booked for some combination of a dive and an altercation with the Atletico Madrid technical staff, who had taken up position by the touchline, before a deliberate handball sealed the deal.

Romanian defender Cosmin Contra took up position between the posts, the ill-fitting goalkeeper's jersey betraying the challenges to come.

Jose Antonio Reyes, not long on as a substitute, then picked up the first direct red card of the match for a reckless challenge of his own.

Inevitably, Atleti had the next chance, but Contra was able to get down low to halt Forlan's effort at the near post.

Still, Getafe were on the quest for the goal that they surely deserved, only for Abbiati to come good at last with a tremendous stop from Kepa Blanco's drive.

After such an eventful half, no fewer than seven minutes of stoppage time would do - Maxi, Kepa and Manu picking up yellow cards during the closing stages for good measure - but the match ended as Granero drove his free kick over the bar”.

Ewan Macdonald, Goal.com

Week 8

A lovely lovely week of food, art, walking and lots of good chat.

Well that is after a really tiring day in Biggleswade on Monday (it’s such a glamorous jetset lifestyle I lead – not!!?! – Sleazyjet Madrid to Luton and back within 24 hours – not fun). But it was good to meet mum and dad at Luton and travel back to Madrid with them.

It was such fun to have them here and to do a combination of showing them my favourite places and discovering new ones with them.

Highlights of the week included Lots and LOTS of great food.

We had a great tapas supper when we arrived back in Madrid (10.30pm) at Santa Barbara No.8 with the magic green salted pimientos (1 in 20 is s’posed to be spicy hot so choosing one is meant to be like Russian roulette!).

We ate a fabulous traditional hearty lunch in La Latina (Casa Lucio was full unfortunately, but the maitre d’ directed us to another great restaurant full of Spanish people having ‘proper big lunches’ – it was a Wednesday!). We somehow managed to have heuvos rotos, suckling pig and albondigas (meatballs) before rolling out of the restaurant at 5pm. A lovely man caught me looking at his pudding and trying to work out what it was, so with a big smile, he walked across the restaurant to come and offer me some (it was a bowl of fresh cherries). He did it with great drama, grace and much laughter from everyone, including us.

Breakfast of course was at the Café Commercial everyday (café con leche, zumo, churros, croissant & tostada de tomates). Fernando my lovely waiter (we’ve finally got to the stage of our relationship of exchanging names… you don’t want to rush these things!) was full of chat and banter and as always completely charmed us all.

We had a great lunch sitting on stools at a bar in Atocha (famoso por las bocadillos de calamares). It was fun to take mum and dad because it’s not the kind of place you’d go into in England (photos of the food on the walls, slot machines and everyone throwing their paper napkins on the floor – very madrileno!). But the food is great and it’s SO Madrid.

Plus a beautiful supper at Nina’s on Calle Manuela Malasana (just up the road). It’s a modern Spanish restaurant, uses beautiful fresh ingredients, cooked and presented with real style, and has a nice relaxed atmosphere. We even had a nice chat with Nina herself (bit of a character in the Madrid restaurant business I hear) who showed us her other place around the corner.

We did lots of walking. We walked from Seranno (where we found some shoes that I bought mum for her birthday in the Camper store), down through Retiro parque to Atocha. We did lots of wandering from Sol up to Plaza Major and around that area; from Opera through to La Latina and back to my flat; and then on Friday around Chueca. But of course with plenty of diversions on route.

We went to the Palacio Real, which I enjoyed much more than I expected. It’s a really exuberant display of wealth and status. It has a wonderful big staircase to swish up in your long skirts, huge chandeliers, and the most amazing wall coverings, carpets and mirrors.

It’s a series of chambers, each decorated completely differently from the next so it’s like walking through a children’s picture book, where every time you turn the page you get a instant hit of colour and shapes and mood that’s different from the last. So you go from rich dark red velvets with candles, through to bright blues and florals, then into soft warm golds with a Chinese influence, and then into decorated Spanish tiles that are bright and shiny but cold.

It gives you a little thrill of anticipation as you go through each door, which doesn’t disappoint. It’s really vibrant and opulent, but done with a sense of fun rather than just imposing. My favourite was the chinoiserie room with hand-embroidered wall coverings, huge mahogany mirrors and a crazy ceiling with 3D vines and flowers all over it and enormous chandeliers. Gorgeous. Might work in my flat in Putney… will give it some thought!!

We also found a brilliant (huge) dance shop that sells flamenco dresses. I have a real thing about wanting one at the moment. You know, for parties, Sunday best, shopping at Sainsburys, that kind of thing. Imagine how fun it would be to do my first crit in January back in Camberwell in a full-length flamenco dress. I imagine myself nonchalantly leaning against the wall in the studio, brushing down my ruffles, a plastic rose behind my ear, saying… “yes, well obviously being in madrid last term has had a profound affect on the development of my practice…” in a proper ‘art school’ pretentious way. It would be so good!

The trouble is that they are stupidly expensive. I tried a couple on in this shop (unfortunately not allowed to take photos – like wedding frock shops!) so I can’t share the full brilliance of it with you, but I found one that I completely LOVED! It was black with huge primary colour spots on it. Huge ruffles on the shoulders and from the knees out. It was gloriously, marvellously, totally over the top and it looked wonderful.

“Why, oh why,“ I hear you cry, “did you not purchase it on the spot?”. Kind readers I share your sense of wonder. Unfortunately the slight issue of €480 stood before me and this utter gorgeousness. Mum and dad did of course offer to contribute so I could have it for Christmas (yes I know I’m 34 but they did!). However sense prevailed, and although of course I could wear it for shopping at Sainsburys, I had to be honest about how often I really would… I think the ruffles might get caught in the wheels of the trolley and I’m not sure it would be warm enough in the frozen peas aisle.

So for now it will remain as a beautiful image in my memory, of the kind of haughty gypsy girl that I must have been in another life. Sometimes things are better that way.

We did that night go to a Flamenco show. And it was amazing. Not what I expected at all. The girls weren’t in big fancy dresses and it wasn’t the kind of choreographed touristy thing I imagined we’d get. It was really raw and emotional and I found myself quite taken aback by it.

It was like jazz improvisation in a way. There was so much interaction between the musicians and the dancers and so although the songs were obviously from a genre (ie: some were tragic, some were boisterous, some seductive in their style), the music and the dancing evolves throughout the song – playing off each other. Both the singers and the dancers seemed like instruments and it was like they used their bodies to make sound and music. The dancers were the percussion and were setting the beats, but the singers and musicians were driving it forward at times, and responding to the dancers pace at others.

There was lots of calling and encouragement from the dancers sitting watching each other when it wasn’t their turn – for both the dancers and the musicians. And there was real appreciation of a good move, or a particularly emotional moment. There was a real sense of teamwork, and as if it’s about group participation to make something happen between you all, rather than someone standing up to show off. Although of course each person's talent was extra-ordinary. The skill of the footwork particularly was stunning! It wasn’t pretty or prissy at all. It was tough and aggressive and proud and intense. They were banging at their chests, and pulling at their clothes as they danced. Two of the girls’ hair clips flew out because they danced with so much energy, and by the end of the songs, they were sweating, panting and their hair was all over the place.

I really loved it, and want to find somewhere more ‘authentic’ to see it again. It felt very real to me, but we were in a flamenco club where you sit and have dinner and then watch the performers, so although we didn’t go to one of the big touristy places, it was still probably half Spanish, half tourists there.

This week I’ve seen loads of art, and that’s been great too.

Although I did have a bad hour in the Thyssen-Bornemisza. I went to meet mum and dad there at 4pm, straight from a drawing class which had once again upset me. I was very annoyed at myself. The teacher liking my structure, came over and started showing me how to shade “properly” by shading in huge sections of my drawing, which I then carried on for an hour. At the end of the class I realised that my picture now looks just like everyone else’s, which felt AWFUL. Suddenly it wasn’t my drawing any more and I was so annoyed at myself for having just done what I was told rather than think about what I wanted to be making. I hated it.

Two girls in the class only realised after an hour that they had the wrong drawings and they had been drawing on each others’ picture for an HOUR!! Emma and I thought it was funny at the time – but it’s also tragic!

Anyhow, going from that into the Thyssen and looking at someone’s weird personal collection of 18th century still lifes, and dutch and American and then impressionist paintings, all looking the same and displayed in the same kind of fancy gold frames in an uber-formal way. I decided that the whole world of art is fucked and just becomes like a collection of shoes for rich people and is a stupid thing to waste your time doing.

Poor mum and dad, it being their first day (AND it was raining on them – the first time it’s rained since I’ve been here!) found me close to tears and we had to leave and go for a wander (in the rain!) instead, while I ranted about how stupid Spain is.

Fortunately a couple of things re-engaged me with art having a point (or at least some joy!).

Andy Goldsworthy in the Palacio de Cristal in Retiro Parque was first stop on my rehabilitation programme! It’s a stunning location. In the nineteenth century glass house in the middle of the park. He’s ‘borrowed’ scots pine logs from the forests to the north of Madrid that are on-route to become commercial products and has made these wonderful huge domed structures from them. After the exhibition they will continue on their journey to become everyday products.

Seeing the logs inside the glass is strange when you’re standing amongst still growing trees in the park. As you walk in you’re hit by the smell of freshly chopped wood (smell isn’t used enough in art I think – it has such an immediate impact that it instantly conjures up lots of memories and associations, in a deeply personal way). The structures are beautiful (both inside and out) and they reminded me of log cabins (they have a pioneering optimism to them) and made me feel as I walked inside like a baby bird in a nest (quite protective). And yet as you look up and realise that all of these logs above you are all just balanced it also feels really quite precarious. Like a game of jenga where if you pulled one out the whole lot could fall. It’s obvious how it’s all made, and yet there’s such a wonder in it because of the scale and the patience required to do it. Maybe that’s kind of like nature itself.

Annoyingly (and very Madrileno!) they were very strict about not standing in the wrong places and had lots of ‘security’ telling you off if your toes were on the line marking the no-go areas!

Perhaps that’s why I loved Sherri Hay’s show “Disasters” at Begona Malone which we kind of stumbled upon (looking for another gallery that’s now closed down). It was definitely the thing I’ve loved most since I’ve been in Spain.

She had made about 20 crystal ball-sized snow storms and each one was displayed on it’s own shelf around the gallery. You picked them up and gave them a good big shake and then watched it all settle. In each one was a collection of little figures, cars, train wrecks, bridges, houses with roofs destroyed, trees etc. As you watched them settle you saw the devastation you had created. Cars landing on top of people, trees landing inside houses.

It was like being responsible for the cyclon in Wizard of Oz. Or like seeing your actions result in the Madrid train bombing carnage. All in miniture inside a bubble world. Like being god it was wickedly joyful. You shook really hard and smiled at your sense of power as it all got stirred up and then watched with a guilty kind of horror as it settled in a specific way, forcing you to imagine if it were real. It was unnervingly fun being so evil. And completely addictive.

Downstairs she was showing intricate charcol drawings that similarly put you as the audience in the role of semi-passive but culpable witness. They were like nightmare-dream narratives, very Goya-esque. All focused around the circle of a circus ring. And all shown from the perspective of a member of the audience. Someone sitting near the back. And in the circus ring were terrible terrible things.

In one, 3 people had been set on fire and there was a queue of volunteers of people who clearly wanted to be next to partake in the spectacle.

In another people with strapped on wings were throwing themselves from high up in the circus tent and falling. Like Icarus (with his wax wings), or like Lucifer (fallen angel), it wasn’t clear whether they were being told to jump or whether they were actively participating, but they were all falling not flying.

In a third a circle of people stood around the edge of the ring with rifles shooting out at the audience (some of whom had guns and were shooting back) and in the centre was someone dressed in a fluffy bunny outfit, standing very still.

In another, in the ring children were having rides on unicorns at the front, while at the back a large tree with many branches was full of hangman nooses and people were climbing up and hanging themselves.

They were very dark and terrible. Very dreamlike. A commentary on celebrity perhaps and the need we have for spectacle. I couldn’t help thinking of Big Brother when people say “but you chose to be in it, you should have known” while we all relish people self-destructing for our entertainment.

I loved that in her work you cannot be passive. You have to pick up and shake the peice to make the work in the snow storms. Or in the drawings, you cannot escape being placed within the audience of the action (because of the perspective it’s drawn). And therefore you become responsible for the cruelty because you have the sense that without a witness it wouldn’t be happening.

Today Emma and I went down to La Casa Encendida and saw the Warhol sobre Warhol show that opened on Friday. It was better than I thought it would be, and connected with this sense of the tragic in celebrity. It brought to my mind the problem with trying to represent someone and separating out ego from "the truth". It’s interesting what happens when you try to distill something (or particularly perhaps, someone) to an essence. There was a tiny Polaroid of Mick Jagger taken in 1976 (looking young, sexy, cocky and vulnerable) and then a series of prints and drawings distilling him into an icon. And of course while something interesting happens, it also becomes empty and just the abstract idea of someone. We think so much about ourselves as being not about our bodies (ie: we’re really deep down about our souls not the outer stuff). But in trying to get a distillation, in simplifying you also lose so much vigour and realness and it’s the complexity and the NOT oneness that actually makes us, I think. It was surprisingly thought-provoking, since I’ve never really connected to Warhol before.

The other lovely art thing this week was seeing mum so excited about seeing Guernica. She loved it, and had to go back to see it again, before we left the Reina Sofia. It was a real pleasure to witness how much it moved her.

I’ve done a bit of work this week (well I’m thinking of this blog as work too now). Yesterday having spent the day writing, thinking, reading (finished my ‘On Cubism’ book that’s been the weighty tome I’ve been working through for the last couple of weeks) I realised that I needed some fresh air, so got the metro to Casa de Campo (think it’s kind of like Hampstead Heath – city countryside!) and after a bit of a walk discovered the zoo.

I decided on a whim to go in, and although I usually hate zoos (I find them depressing) I actually really enjoyed it. My camera was out of battery so I went to the shop and bought a zebra pencil and an elephant sharpener, and did a whole load of quick (had to be because nothing would stay still!) sketches of the animals.

I really got into doing sketches of the gorillas. One was very funny and kept readjusting, but it was as if he was a life model and he got into strange positions and held each pose for about 3 minutes. It was really good. Because they are SO human like, and yet have such different proportions you really have to look carefully rather than draw from your mind. Plus because their bodies work differently to ours (eg: the feet curl all differently), the drawings actually look very much like my strange distorted body parts that I was doing from my odd objects last term. It was funny but nice to find a connection there in such a strange place (the gorilla house in Madrid zoo!).

I’m continuing to stay pretty chipper about what unknown work will come from all of this. I read (in about 48 hours) a great modern gothic romance this week (The Thirteenth Tale) and in it a Miss-Havisham-type novelist explains how her creativity works. I rather liked this approach, and intend to take it as my own (although maybe without the lonely and bitter old dame thing):

“Life is compost. All my life and all my experience, the events that have befallen me, the people I have known, all my memories, dreams, fantasies, everything I have ever read, all of that has been chucked onto the compost heap where over time it has rotted down to a dark, rich, organic mulch. The process of cellular breakdown makes it unrecognisable. Other people call it the imagination. I think of it as a compost heap. Every so often I take an idea, plant it in the compost, and wait. It feeds on that black stuff that used to be a life, takes its energy for its own. It germinates. Takes root. Produces shoots. And so on and so forth.”

Off now to the Yelmo cinema in Tirso de Molina to see Elizabeth (VO ingles, con subtitlos en espanol). Looking forward to seeing those dastardly Spanish attempting to invade with their armada and bring their strange Spanish ways to British shores, but being kept in their place by the heroic English…! Ole!

Week 7

Now that I’m past the half way point, time seems to be speeding up and there suddenly doesn’t seem to be enough time in the week!

This has been a week of visitors which has been brilliant. Rups was over for a couple of days. A visit of two halves I think it’s fair to say… first 24 hours rather out of sync with each other and so full of frustrations and misunderstandings. It's probably inevitable when we only see each other every 3 weeks and are relying on phone and email to stay connected. But then the last 18 hours, back on form. We had a really good evening out in my neighbourhood, hopping from bar to bar, having a ‘vino tinto’ in each, and a nibble of something lovely. We found a brilliant bar on Calle Colon. It was dark with tiled walls, jammed with people, shelves to the ceiling full of dusty bottles and smokey old adverts. The guys at the bar wore white collarless shirts and black braces (very 1940s), and were carving jamon from huge legs with the hooves still on. To get to the other room we had to literally crawl underneath the bar on our hands and knees. I loved it!

We ended up at a jazz night at Barco. It seemed like everyone else in the place had brought an instrument and after every song the band changed composition… the saxophonist left and was replaced by a fluteist, the girl who played the bass guitar two songs before was back with her bongos, someone else came on with their violin etc. Everyone was very friendly and really getting into it.

It was a bit tantalising to have him leave just as we were getting on well again… but guess that’s the way it has to be. He’s in LA now with Izzie (his sister) for a couple of weeks so we’ve got a 10 hour time difference to try to manage too. But hopefully nothing we can’t cope with. Only 4 weeks till I’m back anyhow so I think best not to fret about it, and try to make the most of talking/emailing when we can.

On Thursday after Rups left in the morning, I had Spanish class with Feli, and then went to college for Pintura Mural, before heading back to the airport to meet Sue (my wonderful sis) and the two babies: Louis (who’s 3 and loves to tell you that fact!), and Rosie (who’s 7 months).

I still can’t really believe that they came. She decided on a bit of a whim to jump on a plane with the two little ones to come from Basel and see me in Madrid (Phil’s away with work in Bankok for the week). It was so great to see them all, and we had a really fun time. Considering we had said we’d keep it pretty low key, we managed to do masses (must be something to do with the kids waking up at 6am – poor Sue!).

Obviously we managed to sqeeze in watching Shrek, Tractor Ted and several episodes of Charlie & Lola on DVD, but also on Friday we did plenty of wandering around Malasana to the various kids playgrounds (there are so many of them – it really is very child-friendly here!). We bought croissants at the Panaderia and went to Café Commercial where we managed to cover most of the table with sticky hot chocolate. My favourite waiter was fab and as friendly as always. He’s just had his 2nd baby and nothing was too much trouble.

We tried to go to a gallery but poor little Louis was a bit frazzled and he had a bit of a tantrum about not going the way we were headed. It was fine in the end (but tough at the time – it does break your heart to see him so upset!!). Mostly it was fine because we just stopped and waited, but it was opportunely helped by a nice old Spanish man who flashed a sweet at Louis as he walked by as a temptation to come, which Louis in the end decided was a good way out of the impasse we’d reached! Smart kid.

People were most taken with the gorgeous kids (not surprising as they are adorable!) but it was funny how many people kept saying “guapo” (“gorgeous”) and wanting to stroke their cheeks. I guess the blue eyes and blond hair really stands out here. Or maybe people here are just more open with each other’s children.

We had lunch by another playground (in fact Louis ate his lunch on the slide) and then in the evening I went out to the market to buy the ingredients for one of the recipes in the cook book Rups bought me (“recipes inspired by the markets of spain”). I impressed myself by my ability to converse with all 3 stall holders that I bought from: the chicken man (yes ONLY sells chicken), the olive man, and the fruit and veg lady (from whom I managed to discover the words for ‘rosemary’, thyme and ‘mint’ which were not on display so I couldn’t use my usual pointing approach!). It tasted pretty damn good though I do say so myself! (chicken with onion, garlic, herbs, sherry (although had to substitute red wine), lemon and olives).

On Saturday we headed down to Sol, and walked up to Plaza Major. Discovered on the way a FANTASTIC ‘Articulos Religioso’ shop. Its windows full of figurines showing (kind of) biblical scenes. Most of which have a single moving part (eg: forward and back hoeing the field). There were some brilliant chickens going up and down feeding, and a rather peculiar ‘Churros’ maker with a magi-mix machine (don’t remember that particular scene in the bible… “blessed are the churros makers…for they make our breakfast?!?”). I imagine this is prime season when all the churches kit out their nativity scenes. Can’t wait to see them in situ!

After more hot chocolate for Louis in Plaza Major, we headed over to Retiro park where we watched a kids open air puppet theatre (reckon the Spanish was pretty much at my level… it seems I’m already speaking as well as a two year old which I think is a pretty good achievement in only 7 weeks!).

Following lunch and the purchase of a special push along helicopter, we went rowing on the lake. Sue was by far the better rower… but Rosie (tied to Sue’s front) didn’t much like the motion so I rowed us - mostly in circles - while Louis captained from the front.

One of the things that was so lovely about having them here was the excuse to play imaginary games all day. I loved it. Louis and I played trains on the high stools in my flat (he was the driver and we went up the mountain and down again, and then to the seaside where we climbed onto my breakfast bar and caught imaginary fish from the side of it. We spent a lot of time doing make-believe tyre changes and various mechanics on a kids seesaw motorbike in the playground. We played at being turtles in the ocean (Louis got to be the shark), and did lots of pretend fishing when in the boat – catching octopuses and jelly fish as well as scary sharks. And then we played nests on the sofa. I was the baby bird and had to lie upside down in the nest that Louis made for me out of all the cushions in the apartment and he fed me lots of imaginary things to eat. Brilliant! I love that the most important thing is to keep the game going and to be able to create a world. Logic doesn’t come into it one jot. You just have to make things seem real through words and acting stuff out, and making silly sound effects.

It was hard to wave them off. Especially when Louis (wearing his monster hat and pulling his little red Maisy Mouse suitcase) on the metro to the airport looked very glum and explained “Me not happy. Me want to stay”. We had to do more nose licking to cheer ourselves up (mine tastes of strawberry apparently, his is definitely banana).

Needless to say with so many visitors I didn’t do too much work during the week (although I like to think that acting like a three year old has to be good for one’s creativity!). Perhaps it was, as all day Sunday I spent doing some paintings, writing in my log book and taking photos. I’m not sure it’s exactly thought through work, but it felt good to be doing stuff.

The paintings are sort of memory paintings. They’re of things that I’ve seen here that I have painted from memory. They are kind of clunky. I think that maybe they’re a reaction to having to do so much work direct from life and observation – and for such long detailed poses (15 hours). It means that I’m quite interested in what one remembers about things and how unreliable that is. I guess it’s like I was saying about lostness last week – noticing details is an inconsistent thing.

I’ve been trying to paint the Virgin Mary altar piece that I saw in the church during the Bach concert a few weeks ago. I have the image of it very vividly in my mind, and yet trying to recreate it without something in front of you is difficult.

I think it’s because you don’t remember all of the elements equally. So for example, I seem to remember quite vividly the pattern on her dress and the light on her halo, but have no sense of her face at all. It makes for a peculiar painting because different parts have different amounts of detail. But then maybe that’s more true to the experience of life. Some parts are rich and full of texture, and others pass in a blur. That’s why things like maps are an odd way of representing space. They are so uniform and consistent which isn’t how one experiences a place at all.

I think that the idea of experiential art is an interesting one. By that I mean people like Francis Alys (his work keeps bugging me and I can’t leave it alone). Like Richard Long, the work is really an action which is then documented. Like him I’ve been making patterns from maps of Madrid (patterns based on the suburbs of the city). I think that perhaps they’ll form walks, in which I’ll discover or collect things. It’s odd marking routes on the maps of places that you don’t know. I can’t help but imagine what the place will be like and use all sorts of instinctive ways of planning the walk. For example street names become important to give a picture in your mind of what a place might be like (even though I know they are usually chosen so arbitrarily). Without knowing anything about these places, I already have quite a strong idea in my mind about what they will be like. I almost don’t want to go, as I know that my picture will be instantly erased when I’m actually there.

Emma and I have been talking about souvenirs and photographs and why one feels the need to make memories tangible. I know that I have quite a mania for collecting evidence of my experiences. I love to take photos (especially with me in them!!) to somehow ‘prove’ that I was there. And I always keep the tickets and leaflets and flyers of places that I go (even in London). This blog is a classic example of how I need to give my experiences some kind of form. Maybe it’s about sharing the experience. Perhaps it doesn’t feel real unless it’s acknowledged by someone else. Or possibly I doubt my ability to remember accurately, and believe that I need triggers to hold onto an experience in my mind. Yet there is not reason why today’s recollection would be more reliable (or ‘true’) than the memory I’ll have in 10 years time.

Inspired by our Pintura Mural class, and a conversation Rups and I had about graffiti, I went out for a couple of hours to photograph the streets near where I live. Sunday afternoon is a great time for it, as all the shops are closed and so the shutters are down showcasing some really impressive work.

It’s an interesting spectrum from grubby, messy tagging with pens, to big bold visual grafitti, to independently commissioned (or permission granted) street art, through to corporations appropriating street art and turning it into advertising.

Interestingly I find either end of the spectrum annoying, but love the middle territories (huge value judgements inherent there!).

The messy tagging is interesting. There is MASSES of it, and it is very intrusive. And yet, although visually it’s not attractive, I am intrigued by two aspects of it. Firstly the need that it reflects. Why do people feel they have to make their mark on public space? Is it anger at being disenfranchised? Is it a marking of territory to give you a bigger sense of yourself? Is it leaving a souvenir of your having been here (like my photos are)?

And then I like the fact that it’s not stopped. I love the fact that there’s no CCTV in Madrid. That despite all the controlling elements of this culture, there is also a sense that public space is really public (which we don’t have in the UK). Perhaps it's because people spend so much time out of doors, walking around in the evenings, that people do feel that the streets belong to them. There is something very liberal about allowing (or at least putting up with) the tagging. Perhaps here no-one really owns the outside walls of buildings. Something I don’t think we share in the UK where graffiti is seen as destruction of private property, and therefore a crime. Although if you think about it, it doesn't actually take away any of the building's space it just adds a layer - taking from the air space around building.

At the other extreme I find myself angry at the sanitised, corporate use of graffiti for advertising (trying to borrow some cudos of the 'cool' area which the big brands are targeting). And yet why should it be OK for a small independent shop to hire an artist to paint their shop front (it’s charmingly unique!) and not a big business? Likewise why should I love the old Farmacia covered in patterned tiles advertising products from the turn of the century, and hate the slogans in the Sfera mural? Surely advertising is advertising? Or maybe not…

So as you can see my work is not really following a specific theme but developing in a number of directions. Emma and I have agreed to write our wish-list of all the things we want to do in our last few weeks in Madrid. To be honest I think that’s the best way to continue. Get stuck into as much as I can while I'm here, and absorb as much as I can from this experience and digest it when I get home at Christmas. Suck the marrow now, and sort out the bones later.

Week 6

Last week in Madrid once again flew by. School continued much the same (but fine). Went to the private viewing of film called ‘Spinning’ at the Madrid Gay Film Festival with Sarah (a first film made on shoe-string budget, by her old landlord about gay men having children). Reckon I understood about 10% of the dialogue but got the story pretty well and it was beautifully filmed in Madrid (fun spotting familiar places!) and was bright, optimistic, and quirky.

This week’s blog comes from about 30,000 ft above France (I guess) as it is written on the way back to Madrid after a weekend in the UK.

Having met up with Rups at Gatwick for a couple of lovely hours on Friday afternoon, I spent the weekend with Emma and the girls in Chichester for her hen. Lots of chat, mad Everest-climbing stories from Anna, champagne, a bike ride, spa and masses of food (not to mention the extremely handsome young piano-playing owner of the country house who ended up accompanying our terrible singing on the white Steinway grand until 3am). It was really great.

But I found it very odd going home for a couple of hours on Sunday afternoon to pick up a few things.

Weirdly everything looked wrong and different when I walked in. It was quite bizarre and unsettling. The proportions of the rooms looked like they had changed, which obviously isn’t the case, but it quite shook me at the time. How could it seem so alien after so little time (only 6 weeks)?

It’s very odd the way that you trust your sense of your memory so much when it’s such an unreliable and changeable being. It was an actual physical experience – kind of like lurching, as my mind tried to marry up what it could see with what it obviously expected. If I were trying to recreate it I’d use a sudden zoom in-out mechanism on a hand-held video camera… something that makes you feel quite off-balance. A very strange sensation.

Last night I hardly slept at all. I really don’t know why. Dozed but felt as if I was awake all night. I had a dream where I was in a lecture theatre and the teacher made me stand up and ask in Spanish who spoke English. I was very pleased with myself that I remembered the verb “teneis” (“to have” in tu-plural). But I had to repeat it several times because it wasn’t loud enough and eventually when I shouted it, I realised to my horror that I’d been tricked into getting people to expose each other… so suddenly people in the lecture hall were standing and pointing at others and shouting “them, it’s them, they do” as if speaking English was a crime. Weird.

The meeting in London went really well though. It was good to see the group again, and to see the packaging and advertising ideas. It makes me feel that we’ve done a really great job getting them to a place where there’s a clear and inspiring brief that the agencies all seem really excited about. I’m really proud of my team and what we’ve achieved – it’s a real buzz.

So being back in the UK was a bit strange, but a positive side-effect is that I’m really excited about getting back to Madrid. Something that I don’t think I would have said 10 days ago (maybe helped by the fact Rups is on the plane too coming over for few days!). It’s definitely a good feeling.

Talking to Rups and to Anna and Emma on the weekend, I was surprised that people say “oh god you poor thing, it sounds awful” from reading this blog. I mean, I’m not saying that it isn’t fucking hard at times, but to me it’s a genuinely mixed bag. Lots of ups and lots of downs! I’m not sure whether it’s because I’m usually pretty chipper and cheerful about things therefore people assume it must be really bad if I’m moaning. Or whether actually I’m using the blog as a bit of a release mechanism so I write most about what’s upsetting me. Or maybe it’s the difficult things that I find the most interesting so that’s what I focus on. Probably it’s a combination of them all. I get the sense it’s difficult for people who know me well to read about the tough bits, but I want this account to be warts-and-all. I guess ultimately I’m writing this for me and not really for anyone else.

If it really was terrible, I WOULD be packing my bags and going back to Blighty (no qualms about that!). I’m here because it is where I want to be at the moment, and I’m learning masses, some of which is great, some of which is a struggle.

One of the things I’m really keen to do, is get on with is some of my own work.

I had a really encouraging email from Jim (Erasmus tutor at Camberwell) following a rather stroppy outburst from me about feeling abandoned. He reminded me of the work that I was doing in my drawing elective (last January) about feet and walking and mapping. He made an interesting observation about the struggle that I have with drawing skills (what being able to draw means) and how I’m revisiting similar territory that I was debating a year ago. He was also really supportive about just getting on with stuff:

“You are a second year student. You must question everything and not be afraid of experimentation and to push your ideas forward in whatever direction, media or format you see fit.

You have settled into a new space and you must give yourself permission to have the confidence to start researching and playing with these ideas. Don’t let the lack of studio space at the University get in the way; the rest of Spain is outside the front door.”

Last week in Pintura Mural we agreed to continue with the theme of Lost-ness and navigation. We’ve set each other some assignments to do which will be helpful I hope. Jolie has set us the task of writing about ‘Lost-ness’, and I figure that maybe this blog is as good a medium for doing that as any.

I’m not sure that “Lost-ness” is a proper word. Although the vagueness of it seems appropriate. What I want to write about is being lost. I look back and feel I’ve spent much of my life feeling lost, and yet find it difficult to describe.

Being lost sounds as if it’s not knowing where you are. But in a way it’s the opposite. Right now, I’ve no idea about where I am in the context of Europe (just gone over the Spanish border – but no idea where). But I’m very comfortable where I am in terms of my physical space. The seat in front of me is blue with a orange squared pattern, the exit signs are in red, the fold-down tray on which my computer sits is pale grey, the safety instructions show how to slide calmly off the wing of the plane, and the duty-free magazine suggests you eat Pringles with your cup of Twinings tea. Everything about Easy Jet is designed to be familiar. So despite having no idea where I am, I do not feel at all lost.

Likewise I can have no idea of what physically surrounds me because I’m really not noticing it (I might be having a good conversation on my mobile phone, or am day dreaming and in a world of my own). I have no idea where I am, but again do not feel lost, because I am not aware.

Instead, feeling lost is about suddenly having an acute sense of the detail of the unfamiliar such that you recognise that it’s totally unknown. It’s noticing exactly where you are – but realising it’s not where you want to be. It’s when I’m walking down a street and realise that I don’t know those tall buildings with the pattered brick and the green painted balconies, or when the corner that I was expecting to come up on the left with the pastry shop that sells strawberry tarts, suddenly isn’t there – instead it’s a vodaphone store.

I realise that I’m lost through noticing unfamiliar details.

Oddly it also happens in places where I do know where I am. Driving down a road in Cambridge that I’ve been down many times before, I suddenly notice an old garage with a blue and yellow sign. I’m convinced that I’ve never seen that before. So I start to question whether I am actually on the right road. I think perhaps I took a wrong turn, because it’s impossible to believe I’ve not noticed that sign before. I carry that uneasy fear of being lost until I spot the church with the big gate 100 metres down the road that I recognise and feel quite buoyant (and slightly foolish) because I was on the right track all along.


This sense of lost-ness is definitely connected to having a purpose and destination. The concept of being on “the right track” assumes that there is a place that you’ve got to get to.

What’s so unsettling about being lost? It’s because you won’t get to where you wanted to be, so you’ll miss something that you think is good or important, or you’ll be late or will keep someone else waiting, or you’ll find yourself somewhere uncomfortable (eg: not “safe”, no metro nearby when you’re tired etc). The anxiety inherent in feeling lost is fear of missing something or the fear of the unpredictable.

I’m sure that’s why I feel I spent so many years feeling lost in my life. Full of fear that there was a right direction, but I didn’t know what it was. Feeling that I’d somehow missed an important turning. Or that by going around in circles that I was bound to miss something, because by the time I arrived it would all be over. Feeling baffled at how I had ended up in the place that I was.

The trouble with this feeling of lost is that I was always operating somewhere other than where I really was. Focusing on where I thought I should be (ie: in the future) or on the twists and turns that had got me to where I was (ie: analysing the past).

I have a slightly better idea of how I ended up where I am now (although finding myself living alone in Madrid is quite a surprise!) but if anything I now have even LESS idea about where I’m heading. And yet I don’t feel so lost any more. The less I worry about the destination and whether it’ll suit other people, the less lost I feel. The more I allow the unpredictable some space to breathe, the more interesting things seem to become.

Being in Madrid has been hugely disorientating. So much is unfamiliar that in many situations I’m totally lost as to how to respond. And yet it hasn’t made me feel as lost as I did when I was in an eight-year relationship and a safe long-term career.

I’m noticing the details of where I am in my life. The things I like. The things I don’t. The things that work for me. The things that don’t. I’m trying to focus on what’s around me, to explore the familiar and the unfamiliar. I want to look up and see the details on the balconies rather than have my nose in the map. Perhaps I am still going around in circles, but most of the time I’ve stopped feeling so lost.

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.

Dante Alighieri (1265 - 1321), The Divine Comedy

Week 5

Well this has got to be a good sign… I can’t be arsed to write this week’s blog! Hurrah! I think it’s a good omen that things are on the up.

Biggest and best news of the week is that I’ve got a new place to live… and I LOVE IT!!!

It’s a fab flat right on Calle Fuencarral (v. trendy don’t cha know!) and while it’s costing lots, it’s worth every penny to have my own space (and a very stylish space it is too!). Far better to be happy than have money in the bank!

It’s only about 5 minutes from where I was living before, which is brilliant because it means that I can still go to my favourite café for my coffee in the morning and I know the nice places to shop and drink around here.

Getting the flat sorted was a bit of a scramble last week so took up a fair bit of time, but it really feels like a fresh start being here now. There’s internet access AND mobile reception – hurrah! I really feel I’ll be able to do some work in the apartment (there’s 2 big double door windows with little balconies, so it’s really light and the sun streams in throughout the afternoon). In fact I started a painting this morning… It will be brilliant when people come to stay and it looks like the sofa bed is set to have it’s springs tested!

I’ve got a veritable queue now lined up for the next few weeks. Rups is coming back with me after Emma’s hen-do next Monday for a few days. Then my sister and the babies are coming for a 2 day flying visit from Basel (Louis who’s just turned 3 is guaranteed to generate plenty of laughter). Then there’s a string of people coming out for birthday celebrations: Mum and Dad for hers, Anna for her birthday weekend and then Matt and Sarah for the weekend after his. Plenty of good times me-thinks!

Last Thursday was a bank holiday (la dia del meurte – day of the dead). It’s the day that people take flowers to the cemeteries, tend the graves and have a big family meal. Elena and I went to see Kate and her family. Kate’s recently moved about an hour outside Madrid to a lovely house with amazing views of the mountains and it was hard to believe it was the 1st November as we ate lunch on the terrace in the sunshine wearing only t-shirts. Lovely!

It was great to see her and we had lots of good chats exchanging news about old friends. It did shock me a little though seeing her ‘Interno’s’ room. She has a Paraguayan “chica” (“girl” – but she’s 26) who lives with them from Monday until Saturday morning every week. She helps take care of the 2 kids and does all the cooking and cleaning and washing and ironing. She has a small room downstairs by the garage. Apparently by working for Kate for two years she’ll be able to afford to buy a house in Paraguay (because they’re only €15,000 there). Kate was funny because she was talking about how this girl goes down to the internet café in the village in the evening and chats to her friends back home on-line. “Some people” Kate said “don’t even let theirs go out at night… can you imagine!”. I had to chuckle and felt rather a bond with her ‘Interno’ having spent plenty of evenings myself over the last few weeks in crappy internet cafes full of south Americans!

On Thursday night Emma and I went out with her new flat mate and his friend (both Spanish psychologists in their 30s) in La Latina (her new ‘hood). Was another really good night, bar hopping, eating the famosa heuvos rotos at Casa Lucio Taberna. It’s basically eggs and chips (!) but translates as “broken eggs” – apparently a phrase to be used with caution because in different circumstances it can mean “I’m going to break your balls”. Could be a handy thing to know! There was plenty of banter and we were given a Spanish wine lesson. Apparently Rioja has the best marketing but Somontano and Ribera del Duero are much better! After a few glasses we couldn’t help but agree.

I moved home on Friday and Emma came over and we drank another good bottle of Ribera del Duero and watched a rubbish DVD fllm about Goya.

I went to a couple of contemporary galleries on Saturday which also cheered me up – seeing some good contemporary video installation work here in Madrid and some big and bold and jolly paintings.

After a night out in Chueca on Saturday with a variety of people I’ve met along the way (Spanish classes and college) I went to El Rastro on Sunday to the massive market there. It’s HUGE and absolutely crazily chocker with people. It’s mostly selling rubbish (bit like Camden market) but it’s a really good atmosphere and as long as you don’t need to get anywhere and are just happy to be carried along by the crowd it’s good fun. I bought some brilliantly tacky touristy fridge magnets to put my photos on my new fridge door!

I found that the church nearby had a free Bach Cantantas (choral) concert on so I went to that on my own last night. It was jammed to the rafters so standing room only. In fact I perched at the back on the steps of the confessional box. A lovely old man next to me kept joking about sneaking into it and watching the concert from behind the grill. Those are the times when I especially wish I could speak better Spanish, as even though I understood the joke and laughed along, I couldn’t really respond properly!

The singing was beautiful and the altar piece especially lovely. It was a very simplified virgin Mary with enormous halo sparks coming out from all around her, floating on a bed of flowers. I looked at it for an hour and a half and fell totally in love with it and with her, while the music filled the space.


Now the shocking news of today is that my anatomy teacher actually said he liked (yes “mi gusto”!!!) two of my drawings. He said (well kind of acted out for me, as I didn’t entirely understand the vocabulary) that I had got the structure right and that the structure is like the scaffolding… now I’ve just got to spend time building the house. Anyhow it cheered me up no end (funny how you draw better when you’re happier anyhow… must be a lesson in that!). So we went from 3 hours of anatomy drawing, straight into another 3 hour class of life drawing!

Emma was laughing at me today (what’s new!?!) because she says that I’m succumbing to their evil ways and have started emulating their cheesy style now, and am even talking about my drawings either being ‘right’ or ‘wrong’. She’s fair to point it out, but I do also think that if I’m going to be in the class and have my work constantly criticised then I might as well try to take on board what they’re saying. I hope that if I learn a bit of technique then I can still hold onto a sense of individuality too…. I’m only here till Christmas!!! I think I can resist being totally brainwashed. It’s a bit of a change of view from last week I know – but then as all those who know me will recognise, U-turns have often been my speciality. This lady is definitely FOR turning!

And one of the great things about this weekend and today is that I’ve done quite a bit of laughing! Muy muy importante!

Spanish class tomorrow morning and I've not yet done my homework. Feli was great last week, so I think the classes are going to work well and she lives just around the corner which is nice and easy. So I think I should head to my lovely bed - “and it’s mine… all mine!!!!” [cue evil laugh… fade to close….].