PETE'S PIPE PICKLE...PETER DOHERTY, ARTIST, COB GALLERY LONDON

I know...I couldn't believe it either, is there no end to this bohemian oaf's talent? A difficult one to defend I won't deny but I maintain my respect for Doherty's determination to live life entirely on his own terms - two fingers to the red tops and dreary suburbanite haters, (styled by Primark, engaged to university sweetheart, holidays in Mallorca) lurking around office water coolers across this green and pleasant land accusing him of leading the kids astray with his blatantly drug-addled buffoonery or worse - obvious lack of talent. Lets face it, the guy is hilarious with his antics and if he was good enough for Cocaine Kate then hes good enough for me. Its called rock'n'roll people!! Nobody gave a shit when Keef spent half the '70s on the nod.

Peter, being a Rimbaud-reading boho now lives in Paris where his brand of louche decadence is perfectly acceptable, positively encouraged in some arrondissements. Everything about Peter from his nonchalant sartorial elegance to his pretty-boy-lost-in-a-dream-world-of-fey-literary-heroes-adrift-in-Arcadia countenance seems to fit like a glove with the je ne sais quoi, that indefinable charm of the City of Light. His reported recent friendship with a certain Madame Sarkozy seems the perfect Parisian fusion of his charisma and her inherent rebellion. Underneath the artifice...they are two sides to the same coin, the post modern Birkin and Gainsbourg.

LL Cool P....Parisienne mademoiselles know the score...

So Mr. Doherty has now evolved his notorious blood fetish into a new career as an emerging visual artist - his idiosyncratic canvases recently exhibited at the Cob Gallery in London's Camden Town. A few of Doherty's mono and neutral toned multimedia pieces were mildly interesting (below)...combining elements of collage, his own putrid blood, tabloid newspaper imagery plus the detritus of a chaotic life with his largely illegible 'word vomit' pencil scribblings.

Far more striking were the installations in the gallery's basement. Featuring all manner of symbolic, Dohertyesque objects (Babycham anyone?), the subterranean opium eater's cave was draped with threadbare flags, sweat-stained backstage passes, ancient typewriters, vintage guitars and beautiful antique crucifixes. The only things missing were burnt foils, dirty spoons and a crack pipe stained with Amy Winehouse's lipstick. Vinyl punk albums littered the floor and a decrepit Beatles poster from the (sadly) now defunct News Of The World gave the installation a real sense of authenticity, as though you were poking through this genuine music fan's own personal wreckage of the Albion Rooms circa 2001. Which I probably was. I love Doherty's celebration of his Englishness and pride in the ancient motifs of a once great country now consigned to the imagination of poets and dreamers. As a songwriter, Doherty's talent lies in evoking this lyrical imagery of a lost utopia. As a visual artist he offers up the tangible, literal interpretation.

TOLSTOY'S TABLE

Totally a weird moment standing in the dining room of Tolstoy's Moscow gaff as seen in the picture above...if only I'd looked half as stylish as Mrs Tolstoy rocking the high-necked, puffed-sleeved confection!! Well and truly over my crazy old Land of Babushka Cronks now so I'm going to end on a few great pieces of Russian art we managed to see before its back to dear old Blighty toot sweet....прощание великого восточного земли царя и олигархи!!!

THE MOSCOW METRO...A CRONK'S DREAM

No words....just pictures....



CHESME CHURCH...I WANT TO EAT YOU...

And now for something completely different...

Yes, thats right...drum roll please...another spectacular, candy coloured, mouth-wateringly pretty church!
This ones the Russian Orthodox Chesme Church in the southern Moskovskaya district of St Petersburg. Looking like a delicious wedding cake that might grace the ostentatious table of Elton John's civil partnership reception, the church stands all alone, set back from the street and surrounded by unnamed graves of the casualties of Russian wars.

The church's beautifully intricate design is delicate and feminine, completed in 1870 for Catherine the Great. The bold salmon pink exterior accented by pale grey detailing and stark white stripes complete with twiddly edges looked just like your great grandmother's antique Russian wedding veil. Chesme truly is a little girl's fantasy church and its sparse, elongated pastel interior drenched in a warm, dreamy light really created an atmosphere of holy serenity.     

A few huge (we're in Russia remember) blocks away from Chesme stood the impressive Moskovskaya Plochad...thats Moscow Square to you peeps...featuring this iconic and effing well enormous statue commemorating Commie Good Times below. Lenin's defiant stance and the monument's cold, secular arrogance provided a sharp contrast to the church's protective charms. The power and immensity of the Communist state's iron grip remains embodied in the square's design however, the creepy, authoritarian Stalinist architecture of the House of Soviets (built for, but never used as government headquarters) backdropping Lenin's dramatic overtures. Thank god there were a few of the ubiqituous affectionate young couples in situ to modernise the place - mooching around, sipping pivo and watching the old ladies in colourful headscarves selling vegetables to local volk. Thirty rubles for a turnip you say? Bargain. 

PUSHKINSKAYA 10 ART CENTRE, ST PETERSBURG

One of the grittier artistic sights of Olde Petersburge was the Pushkinskaya 10 Art Centre. Housed in one of the grim apartment complexes south west of Nevsky Prospekt, the organisation's front entrance (below) appeared not unlike a Soviet gentleman's cottaging establishment.

The centre, established in 1989 is an artists' collective combining studios, residential flats, a bar/niteklub called Fish Fabrique and various other outlets for unbridled local creativity. Unfortunately, most of the galleries were either closed on account of their haphazard, non-conformist opening hours or too intimidating for a couple of piss-weak gaijin chancers like ourselves to actually enter. However, the residents' comings and goings (complete with the Soviet Death Stare directed as us two clowns) gave us license to slip in uninvited to the apartments' communal areas and have a right old sticky beak. Heres what we found...