Abroad For The Day

Yesterday found me 'abroad' in Wales for the day as my friend H (of GNO fame) suggested we take a train trip to Cardiff to take in the Sisley exhibition at the National Museum and Gallery of Wales. She also suggested we have lunch at Madame Fromage, a marvellous chance discovery we'd made when we went to the RHS Cardiff Show last year. A combination I couldn't resist.

It was another day of chance discoveries. The National Museum is a magnificent place, built at the beginning of the Art Deco era, so is full of clean lines and elegant details. I didn't know Sisley had spent part of his final years in Wales painting the area around Langland Bay on the Gower Peninsula. Many of my childhood holidays were spent at this very spot as we often visited my aunt and uncle in Swansea, so I was able to play back some of my very early memories through a painter's eyes.

Another surprise was the Diane Arbus exhibition. I'd studied her at A level photography classes a few years ago and was keen to make her reacquaintance. I love her photographs, but she had a way of making the ordinary seem slightly disturbing and the extraordinary even more so. An exhibition about Darwin's time in Wales, mouthwatering ceramics, paintings by Monet (including studies of Venice and those famous water lilies) and a walk round Rodin's The Kiss meant we found far more culture than we'd bargained for.

Cardiff is full of little shopping arcades stuffed with tiny boutiques, vintage clothing, designer jewellers (at very reasonable prices) and cafes. This is where Madame Fromage is to be found (do click on the link to have a look) - a family run deli, proud of its Welsh heritage and visited by a Welsh rugby player (so H tells me) at the table next to us. Their Cawl is to die for, though you need to starve for a week beforehand to do it justice. As a result we needed to walk round the shops afterwards, where we found some public planting for me to show you soon. We also chanced upon an exhibition by local artists in the old library: H bought a painting and I liked the play of light from the window. All this and the lilting sound of Welsh speakers rounded off our day spent 'abroad' perfectly.

Comments

  1. Monica the Garden Faerie17 May 2009 at 15:05

    Looks like fun! I live within 40 miles of Canada, and it is fun to be "abroad" for the day! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hermes17 May 2009 at 15:35

    What a great day out, Sisley was a great painter. I love crossing the bridge into Wales.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Unknown17 May 2009 at 16:01

    Such good fun! I'm glad you had a chance to go 'abroad' (am consumed with envy on this) and to get a little non-gardening fun into the mix.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Helen/patientgardener17 May 2009 at 19:23

    Feeling jealous of your lovely day out. Glad you had such a nice time and enjoyed the culture

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anna18 May 2009 at 16:28

    Sounds a good day out. We saw 'The Kiss' in Liverpool last year - it must be traveling about the country which is great :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. VP23 May 2009 at 10:50

    Monica - yes it is a lot of fun and as we heard lots of people speaking Welsh, it felt much more like it too!

    Hermes - it was great seeing them for real.

    Jodi - it's so good to have a break from both gardening and blogging for a change!

    PG - I also had a day long natter to my friend too :)

    Anna - it might be on tour, but there's also 3 versions of it. The Tate has a marble version for instance, the one we saw was in bronze.

    ReplyDelete

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