The Sunday Times - UK (2022-05-22)

ART

Feminine Power at the British

Museum is two exhibitions

happening at once. First, it’s a

survey of the female divinities

that have been worshipped,

collected and invented round

the world since humans began

making art. From Sedna,

half-woman, half-seal, the

Inuit mistress of the sea, to

Minerva, the simultaneous

Roman goddess of war and

wisdom; from Kali, the

furious Hindu slasher with a

taste for blood and knives, to

Mary, the soothing virgin

mother, every global religion

has had cause at some point

to visualise a distaff divinity.

That is show one. Show

two is the presentation of

a contemporary feminine

viewpoint that addresses this

international history of the

goddesses and seeks to direct

our understanding of it. The

first thing we encounter is a set

of large video screens on which

a full house of female thinkers

instructs us on different ways

to view the event ahead.

“This exhibition is about

transition,” the writer Bonnie

Greer announces, “so you

better leave all your baggage

behind... because you’re

going to be changed.”

“Question who society

is heroising and who

society is othering,”

the journalist and

novelist Elizabeth

Day demands.

“Don’t expect any

simple answer here,”

the historian Mary Beard

warns, “but get ready to

explore a problem that

every culture in the history

of the world has faced.”

I bow to no one in my

appreciation of Professor

Beard. As a trustee of the

British Museum, she can

put herself at the front of as

many shows as she wishes

and I will not complain. But

the sheer noisiness of these

spoken instructions is a

problem. Presented on a

loop, they can be heard in

every corner of the show

and, frankly, make it

genuinely difficult to

concentrate on the art. It’s

like being stuck in a room

with a talking parrot. For

the first few minutes the

repeated utterance of “Pretty

Polly” is charming. After a

while you just want it to stop.

But if you put your fingers

in your ears there are, of

course, intriguing things to

see here. Divided into

thematic sections, each

dealing with a key area of

feminine agency, the

show confronts us with a

crowd of goddesses from

every corner of the globe.

Occasionally an appropriate

example of contemporary art

fertilises the journey with

modern moods.

The opening section is

devoted to creation and the

thunderous earth mothers

that populate the world’s

many origin myths.

The Hawaiian

goddess Pele is said

to be responsible

for the eruption of

volcanoes, so she

appears in a beautiful

carving made from the

THE

CRITICS

ohi’a tree, a timber that is

naturally coloured red. Mami

Wata, the African river

goddess, woman on top, fish

below, glistens at us from a

shiny brass plate manufactured

in Birmingham in the 19th

century, then transformed

with Mami Wata imagery by

the Efik people of Nigeria.

I was surprised to see

included an Irish Sheela na

gig, one of those mysterious

medieval church sculptures of

a female grotesque displaying

her enlarged vulva. The show

Look,

don’t

listen

POP & ROCK

CLASSICAL

ALBUM

OF THE

WEEK

Harry’s in his element

Harry Styles

Harry’s House HHHH

Columbia/Erskine

The former

1D member’s

third album

makes the

try-hard,

grab-bagging genre

opportunism of his debut

seem like the work of a

different artist. Styles has

grown into his new

incarnation and, now a bona

fide solo superstar, is having

a ball. His promotional shots

and videos play with

androgyny and smash

through gender

barriers laudably.

He recently did a

cover shoot with an

interiors magazine

and has just signed

up for a CBeebies

It is never

anything

less than

a pleasure

to listen to

Gyorgy Ligeti’s breakthrough

work of 1966 performed by

an extremely accomplished

choir. The fine Danish

ensemble also give us two

less familiar pieces from the

composer’s cluster period,

Ligeti, Kodaly

Lux Aeterna HHHH

Danish National Vocal

Ensemble, cond

Marcus Creed

OUR

Everything Everything

Raw Data Feel HHHH

Infinity Industries/Awal

Loosely conceptual, Raw

Data Feel is up there with

Everything Everything’s best.

Which is not something

you often say about a band

six albums in. The electro

propulsion and call-and-

response vocals on Jennifer

and My Computer are

evidence of the fun they’re

having. It’s infectious. DC

SOAK

If I Never Know You Like

This Again HHHH

Rough Trade

On Bridie Monds-Watson’s

third album, the singer’s

instantly distinctive voice, at

once bruised and crystalline,

delivers lyrics that are like

diary entries — intimate,

mundane and unsparing. On

songs such as Baby You’re

Full of Shit, you feel like

you’re eavesdropping. DC

bedtime story. What of

the music, you say? The

unavoidable Take on

Me-aping As It Was proves

an accurate guide: Harry’s

House is rooted in the period

1975-85, one minute

conjuring the sappy soft

pop of Andrew Gold (Late

Night Talking), the next

channelling close-harmony

Laurel Canyon acoustica

(the lyrically siftable Little

Freak, the tender Matilda).

Styles crosses the Atlantic

for Eighties new wave

on Keep Driving, and hits

the West Coast again on the

Brothers Johnson-sampling

Daydreaming.

Throughout it all,

Styles is in his

element. It’s

a lovely thing

to witness.

Dan Cairns

Ejszaka es Reggel (Night and

Morning) and the folk song

settings of Matraszentimrei

Dalok (both from 1955) and

his three Phantasien nach

Friedrich Hölderlin from

1982, the first of which

has a thrilling vocal

clamour. The stillness that

Ligeti — and the DNVE —

achieves in the first Ejszaka

is captivating.

An added bonus on

a lovely disc are three

beautifully performed pieces

by his fellow Hungarian

composer Zoltan Kodaly,

including the ever-haunting

Esti Dal (Evening Song). DC

The power of ancient art is drowned

out by shrill, preachy commentary

in a new show about goddesses

WALDEMAR

JANUSZCZAK

16 22 May 2022