Reflecting on Lockdown

The lockdown at 29 Hanover gardens has afforded me the opportunity to watch a few animation films again and again and again with my 2 1/2 year old boy twins. I could probably go on Mastermind and answer questions on the Cars trilogy, Moana or The frog and the Princess. Alongside this relentless repetition are the triumvirate of tidying, cleaning and cooking. But in contrast to our ever more gleaming home I have to admit that yours truly looks worse than ever. My wife, Esther, had a go at cutting my hair and it is now quite charmingly uneven. Neither of us feel the urge to get into ironing which means I slob about in t-shirts and as I rarely leave the house I mainly wear pyjamas and slippers. To add to the glamour I have reduced my shaving to a couple of slices a week so consequently I am quite grizzled. If you put the whole package together you will come up with someone who does not welcome or seek after long self-contemplation in the mirror. This is particularly ironic as I have quite a few mirrors and I love buying them. 

If you go back in history there was a crucial moment when the mirror plate ceased to be more valuable than the frame around it. This turning point is much more recent than you might think. Mirror plate truly became available to the masses only after the mid 19th century when sheets of mirrored glass could pour out of factories. Before then a mirror had to be made from a bubble of blown glass that was flattened out and then later silvered using mercury paint. One of the curiosities of mercury is that it’s fluid nature survives metamorphosis into a paint and with very old mirror you can see where at the bottom of the plate the mercury has become thicker and sparkles brightly as it has flowed over centuries slowly down to the bottom of the plate. 

The earliest mirrors very often have an over scale frame to compensate for the smallness of the mirror plate. You can see this with my Dutch bolection ebony and ebonised ripple mirrors. These extraordinary examples of lathe turning capture the spirit of the late 17th century perfectly. The smart black can conjure up the Puritans in England and the age of Rembrandt in the Low Countries. Black was the smart colour for every aspect of life. The two mirrors I have are identical in size and date but differ in their finish. One is the famous chequer board pattern and the other is a more familiar type of turning. The plainer example however retains its original bevelled mirror plate. This mirror is quite aged but is a miracle survival. The other mirror is rarer but does not retain its original glass. 

It is a comfort that I cannot see myself in the early mirrors, nor can I see myself in the Queen Anne giltwood mirror. That too retains an absolutely wonderful original mirror plate. I live in South London and it is a nice thought to consider that I live a short walk from where this mirror was possibly produced. The most prestigious glass works at the time were in Vauxhall and we now tend to speak when we encounter a superb period mirror plate of it being a Vauxhall plate. We look for a really soft bevel, thin glass and a warm Mercury silvering. This giltwood mirror has it all. In addition it also benefits from its simple but rich design and its original gilding. You can nearly also tell original gilding when looking at so-called Gesso mirrors because the punch work decoration which is so distinctive of the style does not overlap. All the little punched circles are distinct from each other. This is an example of how the craftsmen of the 18th century just had more time to carry out their work than those of later eras. A slipshod approach emerges the more the time and concomitant financial pressure to complete the work is piled on. 

In Italy, perhaps in Venice, in the mid 18th century the normal material for mirrors was in this case eschewed in order to create something that could be gilt wood but is in fact gilt bronze. This marvellously fluid rococo design is just delightful to roam round with the eye. There are so many delightful curves and shapes. This is a mirror I can look at myself in because I am never looking at myself I just look at the frame and revel in its shape. In addition I love looking at the nature of the gilding. A master craftsman has burnished it and the surface has been pushed into a sublime subtle ripple which flows over the surface giving it a rich lustre and glitter. 

Moving on to the early 19th century I have a very unusual Regency over mantel mirror. It has a wonderful label on the back trumpeting its Norfolk makers. It is an articulated mirror that tips forward or back depending on whether you are looking to admire yourself or reflect candle light back into the room. By repute a mirror such as this one was supplied for every bedroom mantelpiece at the great Norfolk house Gunton Park. For me I am equally grateful currently that it resides at a height where it is almost impossible to admire oneself. 

Not to forget the 20th century and the revival come celebration of simplicity that came via Italian design in the post war era.  By the front door we have this simple circle of wood suspended from a rope. There is nothing to it except that of course it is the culmination of centuries of mirror making and it is one end of the search. It is as pared down as a design could get. 

Life in the Arts Lane - week 130 - Prepping and Packing

The tension starts to rise a week or so before any fair. No matter how often I exhibit I never can be completely blithe about the process. Back in my Mallett days there were people buzzing around making preparations but now it is all down to me. It begins with a piece of paper and a ruler. I measure out my stand and start imagining the 'mise en scene'; this takes a while, with quite some crossing out and redrawing, but from this skeleton all else follows. The plotting triggers everything including the nervous anticipation of both problems and triumphs. There is always the dream that someone will come on to the stand and buy everything, a fantasy balanced by a nightmare where everything is unsold, damaged and derided. Neither has yet come to pass. 

The dark art of planning a stand.

My current focus is the Olympia Art and Antiques fair which opens ominously on the night of Halloween. I am not going to wear a comedic spooky outfit nor will I bedeck my stand with cobwebs and pumpkins - when most people see my modest prices they are scared enough. There are countless UK and international fairs from September through to December - the Autumn season is packed but as a rough guide the season starts with the Biennnale in Paris and ends with Winter Olympia. This fair strives to mop up the last of the year's buyers before they run off and hunker down to celebrate Christmas. It offers for the most part items of modest value and whilst there is a larding of six-figure pieces - even the occasional seven-figure - the majority will be four and five.  That does not mean the stuff is only decorative, it just means that it is modest. The quirky and the imaginative is what is on offer and that can be excellent and exquisite in execution. 

The fair comes at a difficult time in London because Brexit has triggered a large drop in the value of sterling, and whilst the devaluation creates an opportunity for buyers - providing what appears to be an inbuilt discount - it increases people's sense of nervousness and insecurity. That mood is as discouraging as the reduced price of the items is tempting. In addition many of the buyers at UK Fairs are Europeans and Americans who have moved here for work and their future status is now uncertain. This dissuades them from furnishing in an indulgent way. So within this brittle market Woodham-Smith Ltd and confreres are trying to make a show which will both be commercial and entertaining. To this end we focus on the classic methodologies. We gather fresh things, we show practical pieces with an edge of originality and glamour and we keep our prices down. Invitations will be sent out and good clients personally encouraged to attend. It is a lottery to which we all buy far too many tickets in the hope that one might come good.

Will they be ready on time?

I am getting ready. I have my plan but now I must make a really hard decision. Do I take my wine fridge or not? It is a great boon and comfort to have chilled white wine ready at all times but it is possibly a distraction to spend more time plotting my evening libation than focussing on the customers. Also the fridge itself is no enhancement to the beauty of the stand. Though I am pleased with my 70s revival glasses. It will probably go. 

I walked today through Battersea Park with my friend Arthur Millner, an expert in Indian and Islamic art. He is not an exhibitor but he is giving a lecture at the fair. He was fretting too, he is worried that he has not done enough work in preparation and consequently he is going the shut himself away for the next week to get ready. Nearly all fairs have a lecture programme and an exhibition to enhance the visitors experience. I am uncertain how much potential buyers want to attend lectures but it does make the fair more rounded and organisers want to encourage visitors not just buyers. Although I know his lecture will be excellent, Arthur's nervousness is infectious and back at home I spend a careful afternoon checking up on my preparations. 

At Hatfields, the restorers, they are completing the finishing touches to the items coming to the fair. Richard, the foreman and manager tries not to let his face fall as I bowl in on an almost daily basis asking for the impossible. They say a watched pot never boils and that seems to apply to restoration: if you hang over the shoulder of a craftsman they rebel and down tools - you have to encourage and cajole them like getting a timid cat to come out from under a cupboard. 

In addition, upholsterers and polishers should not consider going away on holiday for a fortnight before a fair - certainly they should not be allowed to. I ring my shippers for the umpteenth time encouraging them urgently to deliver my foreign purchases in time to get them ready. As the fair approaches so does the sense that everything needs to be done at once, preferably yesterday. I can comfort myself with the feeling that I am not alone, similar calls are being made by dealers throughout the land. 

Then comes the computer and the printer wrestling match. Like many dealers I print my descriptions onto sticky labels and then fix those onto string labels. The devils who design the software for label printing at Avery must chortle with delight knowing the exquisite torture they put us through. The box provided for the words never quite lines up with the label that comes out of the printer. It all ends up being a pile of errors dumped into the paper recycling and yours truly ragged and wretched accepting imperfection and scribbling hand-written corrections onto the labels in an unforgivably scruffy way. It is a battle I fight and lose before every fair. 

Nearly ready.

The penultimate battle is the one fought getting the treasures onto the stand and looking good. The carriers arrive and with a requisite amount of complaint and groaning the van is loaded up. The traffic stiffens and, cursing the delays, they arrive to do battle with the fair organisers security. Unlike prison guards who want to keep their inmates in, their struggle is to keep everyone out. If you get your goods to your stand without weeping or cursing their day is clouded. What follows is a sweaty few hours battling with wobbly walls and equally wobbly ladders. Screws fall out, nails bend, pictures hang skew whiff and the furniture tips in unseemly ways due to the uneven floor. In the end it all looks as good as it can and you head home in order to prepare emotionally for the descent of the fair's vetting team next day.

Like blood hounds following a scent the vetters sniff round the fair in pursuit of errors. They rootle about seeking imperfection and deception and debate how best to correct it. Will a change of wording do the trick or does the offending item have to be ejected from the fair?  It is a necessary pain, as mistakes can be made and it is best to do what you can to protect the unwitting public. 

And then it's done. You dust, wipe and move an object slightly to the left. The rest is up to the random delighted guest who falls so in love with an object that they have to take it home. Roll on the 31st October.  

Life in the Arts Lane - week 128 - Push the nose once more against the grindstone -

As I sit on the edge of the bed carelessly pouring sand out of my shoe onto the carpet, I muse that not only am I making a mess but that the summer is drawing to a close. It is always this way - as August shuts down the clouds part and the sun bursts through in an almost mocking way. In my old Mallett days this week began with the tying of a tie and the donning of a sensible dark suit. I would wend my way up to the West End as if it was my first day of school. These days as I inhabit the chaotic world of the self-employed the transition is less physical. I don't get up any earlier and I don't wear work fancy dress as of yore, but there is a palpable sense of the seasonal change.

At the end of July one can sense a kind of exhaustion in the art world as if a long race has been run. The first half of the calendar year is frantic and culminates in a flurry of auctions and fairs leaving the organisers, participants and eager buyers bleary-eyed and blunt to all excitement. Then summer bursts out and for about six weeks people are away. In France it is very obvious as nearly every shop and restaurant actually closes, but here in London there is just the inevitable ‘out of office’ you receive when you send an email, the message service when you call - or even the foreign ring tone followed by a disgruntled voice as you realise you have woken the recipient at about four in the morning. Even the most pushy and energetic dealers have to rein themselves in and take a pause. For this period it is hard to buy and hard to sell but it gives us all time to recharge our batteries.

Even soft toys need some down time.

Perhaps the most dangerous aspect of the summer is that it gives you time to sit back and plan. The idea is that careful reflection and analysis of one’s business and its practice should lead to sensible and thought-through development and enhancement. But for many during this period of repose and reflection myriad hair-brained schemes can percolate, ruminate and generally become more interesting than they actually are. In the absence of business a certain loss of confidence and desperation can kick in and consequently the prospect of starting a scrumpy bar in Somerset or pig farming in rural Burgundy can suddenly seem like fantastic ideas. Luckily, occasionally plotting and planning has to give way to the sensible exercise of one’s time-honed skills and sometimes a small purchase or sale will clear the screen of fantasy and allow reality to once more hold sway.

But my friend Andrew - stylish, tall, blonde, killer salesman - is sitting in his picturesque chateau in France pondering how he can entice private and trade buyers over to visit. Should he give a series of dinners or even a masked ball. He considers how he might create a sort of sensation that will put his location on the touring map of european buyers - in a good way. In London the other sales dynamo, the ever-charming Tarquin from Pimlico road reflects on how to drive sales whilst simultaneously spending less time at his shop. Tucked away in his fortress in the drug-dealing epicentre of South London Nick the internet king spends his days scouring the websites for the holy grail of a cheap shop in a good area with passing trade. What am I doing? I pass my idle summer days considering how it is that I became so addicted to buying and what can I do about it.

Luckily for me the end of summer brings with it the prospect of the next outing - the Decorative Antique fair in Battersea Park which kicks off on the 27th September. It is quite a way off but there are forms to fill in and floor plans to be strategised. The fair suffered a shock this summer as its owner and major force David Juran died suddenly whilst on holiday. He was young - early 50s. The fair will go on and his family will continue to manage it through the already appointed officers but it will nonetheless be strange without his larger-than-life presence, booming voice and signature wearing of the shorts he wore in all seasons. Dogs will still roam the hall and the occasional squirrel or pigeon will wreak the usual havoc - life goes on. I will always remember the visit to Mallett of a distinguished decorator from Los Angeles, who asked me about my boss David Nickerson. He had both retired and died since her last visit as I carefully told her. A tear ran down her face and she expressed great sadness and regret as he was beloved by all. She then pulled herself together saying ‘Lets have a look around.’ She asked me if I was now in charge, and whether she could still get her usual huge discount. I confirmed both and off we went. Life goes on.

The kind of creative insanity that too much rest affords.

We need to get back to work.

Life in the Arts Lane -week 127 - Silly Season – or - how to love tidying?

Silly Season – or - how to love tidying?

Here we are in August in London. In a perfect world we hard-working dealers would now relax and go on holiday having done more than enough business in the first half of the year. But sadly the world is far from perfect. In fact we seem to be faced by a world burdened by an unending catalogue of misery. The list of woes is seemingly endless; the killing of innocent black people in the USA by their own law enforcement officers, the unstoppable rise of Donald Trump, the global tragedy of displaced people through civil wars, the terror that increases every day because of IS, the casual and everyday racism that seems to have become tolerable and acceptable in Britain since we narrowly voted to leave Europe. There is more and more to get distressed by - even jolly old sport is racked by scandals and ‘cheating’. To top it all - business is tough too. What do we do to remedy this situation? My answer is that we should all tidy up.

Is this your home or office?

Tidying puts things in order and for the majority of people it means throwing quite a lot of stuff away. The computer age instead of freeing us from paper has drowned us in it. As paper accumulates even the most avid filer-away will discover on review that a fraction of what has been kept needs to remain. The joy of many full bags of recycling being taken to the dump is hard to define. It is like have an enema - unpleasant beyond description - but you are cleaner and feel better afterwards.

Once you have purged yourself of unwanted paper you need to seamlessly move on to printed-paper. Look at all the catalogues you have accumulated over the years. For me endless auction and dealer magazines together with random sales brochures need to be evicted from my shelves. Books come after magazines and though often beautifully produced I know an awful lot of books will never even be opened or have lain fallow for more than a decade - off to the charity shop. Suddenly shelves are emerging like buds in May. A clear shelf is a thing of beauty.

From the fresh white of an empty shelf I look round my store to assess the random fragments of potentially ‘useful’ things I have accumulated. Several carloads are taken to the dump and some are given away to become cruel clutter for some poor eager fool to accumulate and have to deal with later.

A glimmer of hope.

Then - on a roll - I dive into actual furniture and decide on disposing of bits that have settled in positions around the house and store without my permission. Furniture can do that. Sometimes things creep into the house and hide because you don't know what to do with them. You look behind a door and you are shocked to see what is hiding there. Yesterday someone asked me about a friend whether he was a dealer or a ‘real’ person. I think the remorseless accretion of ‘stuff’ is a problem for both the human race and ‘dealers’. My friend in Norfolk Tony Fell is a dealer and he has an annual evacuation, which is the ‘swap shop’. Rather like the Grand Vizier offering to exchange new lamps for old we dealers would rather have a fresh new white elephant than an old one. You never know – someone might buy it. Vans all over the country are filled and driven to the cricket pitch at Stow on the Wold. There in a feverish couple of hours people swap their unloved items for others that they invest new hope into. One mans sow’s ear is another’s silk purse. For many the greatest joy is not the new opportunity but simply saying good-bye to something you have had for too long. Tony is the master of the ‘long swap’, which is when an object has to be swapped through several hands before it gets to its new home. In extremis often a dealer gets satisfaction from throwing something away in a skip that he or she bought for proper money. The principle is getting freedom from the albatross around the neck. The day closes with a celebratory lunch followed by ritual humiliation as we all play cricket. It is worth it.

So now you have separated the wheat from the chaff. You have to order what remains. The model for me is to consider how quickly you could move out. If you could easily pack and be ready to leave for another home in a week you are a black belt in tidiness. If you cannot imagine moving because sorting everything out would be an unimaginable nightmare - you are in need of intense therapy.

Applying order begins with small steps; I always begin by getting everything of the same ilk into the same space. It sounds bafflingly obvious but you would be surprised how often people don't do this    - because they are used to where things have historically always been. That task achieved I would recommend wiping everything and putting things in boxes. The process of wiping is not cleanliness - it is holding it in your hand. If you handle an object even if it just an old biro or a jar of jam you reevaluate it and you decide whether you want or need it.

Whether this process takes place at home or in the office the clarity of mind and purpose that this undertaking requires can lead to a new approach to life and business. Taking the baggage out of life and making only what you can use or need hang around - may inadvertently improve business by filtering out distractions. When we return after the summer break maybe a little more order and tidiness will make the world seem a more positive place. Maybe life won’t seem so bleak.