147. The Master Doodler

8th June 2014, Tate Modern, Southbank, London

As previously established, art is not really my thing.

But on the very short list of artists whose work I really want to see, Matisse is definitely topping it.

This is only partially because I wrote an essay on him for art class finals circa 14 years ago and he is therefore probably the only artist I really have any in depth knowledge of. And yes, I was so completely and utterly shit at art in the 9th grade that in order to get me a pass, the teacher had me write essays when the other kids tried to draw fruit bowls and make tree sculptures out of papier mache. To this day, my artistic skills are still limited to colouring books.

Also, seeing as I have the artistic attention span of a 5 year old, Matisse meets the criteria of what I need to get from an artist for their art to work for me; lots of pretty and bright colours, an interesting backstory - frequent frenemy of Picasso - and pieces that are not so abstract that they become unidentifiable. Naked blue ladies can never be anything other than naked blue ladies, you know.

Even if I do carry a strong annoyance with many pretentious artists from the 20th and 21st century, calling just about any silly instalment or inkblot pieces of art, it is only modern art that works for me. Stillebens of bananas and wine, portraits of dead people with massive noses (why did they always have massive noses back then?) and pretty pictures of landscapes does nothing for me. I especially dislike the landscape variety, it feels too much like I'm out in the nature and we all know that is an unlikely occurrence for good reasons. Fact is, I once had to leave a Monet exhibition because it felt too much like I was out committing the greatest of sins to human comfort, camping.

A frequent visitor at Tate, I know exactly where the most important places are. Restaurant and gift shop. They really make this culture thing worth your while. And after two big glasses of wine, a bowl of olives and 20 pages of Vogue I was ready to get art appreciating.

I mean no disrespect when I say that the exhibition it was a tribute to doodling. In my opinion, good doodles are worth 100 paintings of sunflowers.

There were the manic doodles that made no sense, the less manic ones that kind of made sense in my semi tipsy head and then of course the blue naked ladies, that in all fairness are not really doodles as such. But other than that, the exhibition had the most awesome doodles there ever was and so many vibrant colours I felt like I had stepped right into the 60's and stumbled upon some serious LSD fumes.

It has dawned on me that I did some very similar work in the studio of my dad's advertising firm in 1990... Watch this space.

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