The Engine

ANDREA HEWITT AT THE WIGMORE HALL The internationally famous Canadian pianist Andrea Hewitt performed works by Claude Debussy (1862-1918), Gabriel Faure (1845-1924), Paul Dukas (1865-1935) and Albert Roussel (1869-1937) at the Wigmore Hall on Friday, 25th November, 2011. The Debussy works, including Suite Bergamasque (c.1890) and L'Isle Joyeuse (1904) all typify the impressionist style of music where there is no dominant key and harmony is the most important element. Hewitt's performance was perfect in terms of tempo and was never circumscribed by critical or audience expectations. The works were played quite slowly so that the music should not become muddied and confused. Her interpretations of these works was warm, humane and forgiving, never machine-like or cold. She allowed few improvisations, however, which might have been appropriate in Golliwog's Cake Walk which needed a bit of jazzing up. Hewitt's attitude to the audience and the music was never calcul

IMAGINARY SYMBOLS OF END TIMES: THE SCULPTURE OF BARRY FLANAGAN 1965-82 Barry Flanagan at the Tate Britain This is a retrospective of the work of the sculpture Barry Flanagan (1941-2009). Flanagan attended St Martin's School of Art from 1964-66 but his approach to sculpture isn't essentially very academic. He uses non-conventional materials such as sand, canvas, rope, sculpted cushions, installation-like assemblages resembling landscapes or even some organic entity or animal, a blue volcano topped with an aluminium object with blunted edge which may also be a face in profile (al casb 4 '67 & aaing j gni aa 1965)). A giant gourd may also resemble sagging testacles or heaped, coloured sand accompanied by two small sacks which may also be testacles stuck on an evaporating sand penis. There's also the influence of Alfred Jarry (1873-1907) and his Pataphysics, 'the science of imaginary solutions' and the work that made Jarry famous, his 'Ubu Roi'.

JOHN MARTIN: APOCALYPSE at the TATE BRITAIN  John Martin (1789-1854) was a British artist born in Newcastle into a working class family. Martin's work contrasts with that of contemporaries William Blake (1757-1827) and JMW Turner (1775-1851). Technically he was compared to Turner and his subject matter overlaps strongly with that of Blake. His reconstructions of biblical scenes offer a great urge towards verisimilitude even if there's always a hotch potch of details as in his painting The Fall of Babylon (1819). Ancient Babylon with 18th century-style ships, Babylonian soldiers in Roman uniform climbing into Victorian carriages under what seem to be Japanese bonsai trees.  Martin wanted to be taken seriously and often provided keys and appendixes to his paintings demonstrating their links to actual history. He sought to engage with Victorian populism, which was very unfashionable among the intellectual elites but also dearly wished to be taken seriously by the art est