Hans Holbein: Successful Careers are the Product of Cultivated Relationships

Hans Holbein the Younger, Mary Shelton, later Lady Heveningham, c.1543?

I recently visited a fine exhibition of the work of Hans Holbein at the Queen’s Gallery, London (until 14 April).

Holbein painted the Tudor court in soft velvets, shining satins and luxurious furs; in elegant gable hoods, smart caps and expensive jewellery. With compelling precision he conveyed his sitters’ warmth and humanity, confidence and wit. At the show you can marvel at the vitality of his preparatory sketches, in coloured chalk - scribbled, scratched and smudged to achieve his desired effects.

I was particularly taken by the way Holbein managed his career, making good use of patrons and sponsors; establishing new connections as the economic and political climate shifted around him.

Born into an artistic family in Augsburg around 1497, Holbein trained with his father and then established himself in Basel, where he painted religious panels and portraits, and designed book illustrations.

During this period Holbein produced several portraits of Desiderius Erasmus, the celebrated philosopher and writer, and illustrated some of his books. Holbein’s relationship with Erasmus came in useful when in the early 1520s religious reforms hit the market for devotional images. The artist decided to try his luck in England, where the Tudor court of Henry VIII was flourishing. He arrived in 1526, carrying a letter of introduction from Erasmus to the lawyer, author and statesman Sir Thomas More. 

'The arts are freezing in this part of the world, and he is on the way to England to pick up some angels.[English coins]’
Erasmus

More thought Holbein’s work ‘wonderful’ and became his first patron in England. With Erasmus’ endorsement and More’s introductions, Holbein soon found work with a rich array of senior courtiers, merchants, landowners and diplomats.

Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/98-1543) - William Reskimer (?-1552) c.1532/34

But power and influence shifted rapidly in Henry’s orbit. When More refused to support the king’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon, the lawyer fell out of favour. He was executed in 1535. 

Holbein meanwhile established new patronage amongst the emergent power circles of the Boleyn family centred around East Anglia; and with Thomas Cromwell, the king's secretary. Cromwell commissioned Holbein to produce reformist and royalist images, and by 1536 the artist was employed as one of the King's Painters on an annual salary of £30.

Holbein created the defining image of Henry: standing in heroic pose, with ornate robes, direct gaze and his feet planted apart. He also drew and painted three of the king’s wives, his daughter Mary and son Edward. Through careful management of his connections, Holbein had made his way to the top of the artistic tree.

Holbein was particularly valued because his portraits were considered accurate. With the king periodically jettisoning his wives, his ambassadors found themselves scouring the royal courts of the Continent for potential new partners. Nervous about ‘whether their images were like to their persons,’ they trusted Holbein to paint them.

Hans Holbein the Younger, John Godsalve, c.1543 CREDIT: Royal Collection Trust/ His Majesty King Charles III 2023

On one such mission Holbein created a portrait of Anne of Cleves whom Henry subsequently wedded in 1539, at the encouragement of Cromwell. The king however was disappointed with Anne in the flesh, and he divorced her after a brief, unconsummated marriage. Cromwell (rather than Holbein) was blamed. He fell out of favour and was executed in1540.

Although Holbein had steered a course through the choppy waters of the Tudor court with admirable dexterity, his career never quite recovered from the demise of Cromwell. He took private commissions, produced miniatures and painted his final portrait of Henry in 1543. He died the same year at the age of 45. 

Of course, Holbein was an artist of exceptional skill. But his success also derived from a considerable gift for networking.

In pursuing our own careers today, we may like to think that we will thrive purely on the basis of our talent and industry; that our worth will be justly recognised by our corporate leaders. But we all need help navigating complex company structures and hierarchies; finding our way through changing industries and sectors. We would do well to nurture mentors, patrons and sponsors; people with experience who believe in us, who will open doors and set us on the right path. Because, as Holbein demonstrated, successful careers are the product of cultivated relationships.

'Don't know what I'd ever do without you,
From the beginning to the end.
You've always been here right beside me,
So, I'll call you my best friend.
Through the good times and the bad ones,
Whether I lose or if I win,
I know one thing that never changes,
And that's you as my best friend.’

Brandy, ‘Best Friend’ (K Crouch / G Mckinney)

No. 461

Claudette Johnson: A Brief Word About Posture and Presence

Claudette Johnson, Trilogy

In 1982 the artist Claudette Johnson was creating a portrait for her degree show at Wolverhampton Polytechnic. The woman she asked to model for her, dressed all in black, ‘put her hands behind her head and planted her feet wide – a position of supreme confidence.’ 

In 1986, now based in London, Johnson asked two other women to adopt poses that reflected who they were. One, wearing jeans and a plain blue sweatshirt, held her head slightly to one side and clasped her hands in front of her. She looked somewhat shy and reserved. The third model, in sharp red trousers and a white shirt, sleeves rolled to her elbows, put her hands on her hips and regarded the artist with a stern, perhaps suspicious, stare. 

The three large portraits were presented together in the piece Trilogy at a recent show at the Courtauld Gallery in London. (Now finished, I’m afraid. But you can still buy the excellent accompanying text: 'Claudette Johnson. Presence'.) They prompt us to consider the ways character and identity can be communicated through posture, bearing and disposition.

Born in Manchester in 1959, Johnson was a founder member of the BLK Art Group. She set out to ‘challenge the marginalisation of Black women’: their absence from art galleries, the passivity and sexualisation of their image when it did appear. She sought to present ‘women who were comfortable in their skin and who exuded an unselfconscious autonomy.’

‘I wanted to look at how women occupy space.’

Claudette Johnson , Blues Dance

A young woman at a blues dance keeps her eyes down, concentrating on the rhythm, lost in her own private reverie. Another with short hair confronts us with folded arms, resolutely silent. A lady in a headscarf reclines on a couch, her head resting on her arms, totally at peace. 

These are tender, intimate, respectful portraits. They have their own quiet authority.

More recently Johnson has turned her attention to Black men. A young lad in a tee shirt seems awkward, eager to get away. A chap in a vest with a necklace lies on a bench, looking past us with a wistful gaze.

Johnson works some parts of her paper with intense detail and leaves others to spare lines and strong colours: ‘solid areas of emptiness, making the absence as significant as what is present.’

Claudette Johnson's 'Reclining Figure' (2017) © Halamish Collection

On visiting the exhibition, I reflected on the many varied ways people present themselves in the world of work. Without perhaps thinking too much about it, through our posture and disposition, we can suggest apathy or aloofness, scepticism or enthusiasm. We can imply strength or weakness, confidence or vulnerability. Our demeanour can draw people in, or push them away.

Perhaps it’s worth considering the signals we’re sending out - as we enter a room, as the meeting gathers, before we even speak. Because our bodies have a language all of their own.

Claudette Johnson, Kind of Blue, 2020.
Gouache, pastel ground, pastel, 1.2 × 1.5 m. Courtesy: © Claudette Johnson and Hollybush Gardens, London. Photograph: AndyKeate

It’s not about adopting the ‘power stance’ beloved of politicians. But rather being conscious of who are and what we’re communicating. Johnson herself encourages creative people to find a mid-point between determination and doubt.

‘I think that as artists we tread a strange path balanced between taking pleasure in what we do and being critical of what we do…Without sufficient self-questioning the work can become self-congratulatory. Without sufficient love, the work cannot come into existence at all.’

'The first time ever I saw your face,
I thought the sun rose in your eyes,
And the moon and the stars were the gifts you gave,
To the dark and the endless skies, my love.
And the first time ever I kissed your mouth,
I felt the earth move in my hand,
Like the trembling heart of a captive bird,
That was there at my command, my love.'

Roberta Flack, 'The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face'

No. 460

Auerbach’s New Monsters: ‘I Don’t Think One Produces a Great Picture Unless One Destroys a Good One in the Process’

Auerbach, Self Portrait 1958

I recently visited a small exhibition of charcoal drawings by Frank Auerbach. (The Courtauld, London until 27 May)

‘I feel there is no grander entity than the human being… I would like my work to stand for individual experience.’

The show presents large-scale portraits of the artist’s friends and lovers, and of himself - mysterious heads that loom out of the darkness, mournful and sad. Auerbach seems to be reflecting on the riddle of presence and existence; on the enigma of individual identity. And he teaches us a lesson about persistence in the quest for excellence.

'I am not interested in making pretty pictures, I want to make something that has impact, that leaves a lasting impression.'

Born in Berlin in 1931, when Auerbach was seven years old he was sent to Britain to escape Nazi persecution. His parents were subsequently killed at Auschwitz.

During his early years as an artist in post-war London, Auerbach produced a series of portraits in charcoal. This material offered a sharp edge with which to draw fine lines, and a soft texture which could be smudged and blurred. He spent months on each drawing, working and reworking it during numerous sessions with the sitter. He rubbed his pictures with his fingers, scrubbed them with a rag, scoured them with a hard typewriter eraser. Every morning the image would be reborn from the ghost of yesterday’s portrait, only to die again later that night. The paper became scuffed and thin, torn and worn through, and he repaired it repeatedly with paper patches - creating the impression of wounds and scars.

‘I don’t think one produces a great picture unless one destroys a good one in the process. And one doesn’t make a great picture by destroying a rotten one.’

When eventually Auerbach determined he was done, he would sometimes finish the work with a flourish of white, blue or red chalk.

'I get the courage to do the improvisation only at the end.’

The portraits, contoured and layered, have a haunted quality. Gloomy eyes, furrowed brows, heads turned down and to one side. These are sombre, melancholy figures, present and yet absent. They have been created in war-battered London, in a world overshadowed by the Holocaust.

'There was a sense of survivors scurrying around a ruined city.’

Auerbach, Gerda Boehm 1961

Auerbach’s Penelopean making and unmaking of his art seems somewhat obsessive. It must have been challenging for his sitters. But he was driven by a clear purpose; by a strong sense of working towards something more truthful.

‘To paint the same head over and over leads to unfamiliarity; eventually you get near the raw truth about it.’

Auerbach was a perfectionist. Sometimes, on seeing photographs of his pictures in exhibitions, he would ask for them to be returned so that he could make adjustments. He believed that he had to struggle if he was to create works that were genuinely fresh and distinctive.

‘What I’m trying to make is a stonking, independent, coherent image that has never been seen before… [that] stalks into the world like a new monster.’

We may think Auerbach’s perfectionism - his creative destruction - inappropariate to the world of commercial creativity. Clients need to be met. Deadlines need to be hit. Budgets need to be respected. Surely sometimes we must be happy with ‘good enough.’

Auerbach, EOW 1960

Yet I’m reminded of my experiences back in the day at BBH, when Creative Director John Hegarty would pass over countless scripts because they were not quite what he had in mind; not sufficiently compelling or different. (I kept in my filing cabinet a stack of unpresented, unproduced Levi’s scripts, imagining that one day this goldmine of creativity would come in useful.)

Hegarty was insistent on quality. He would not give up too soon; would not settle for less. And he was wont to say, many a time and oft’: ‘The good is the enemy of the great.’

It’s always worth being reminded that, in the face of pragmatism and practicality, when confronted with challenging budgets and pressing timelines, we should go the extra mile - if we truly want to achieve something distinctive, memorable and worthwhile; if we ever hope to create our own ‘new monsters.’

'I don't want half-hearted love affairs.
I need someone who really cares.
Life is too short to play silly games.
I have promised myself I won't do that again.
It’s got to be perfect.
It's got to be worth it.
Too many people take second best.
Well I won't take anything less.
It's got to be
Perfect.’

Fairground Attraction. ‘Perfect’ (T Shapiro / S Evans / T Martin)

No 459

Pesellino: Random Reflections on the Communications Industry Prompted by a Fifteenth Century Italian Master

A detail of Francesco Pesellino’s The Story of David and Goliath (around 1445-55) © National Gallery, London

I recently visited an excellent exhibition about the Renaissance painter Francesco Pesellino. (The National Gallery, London until 10 March. Free.)

Pesellino, born into an artistic Florentine family in 1422, trained with his father and later his grandfather, and then formed partnerships with other artists. He painted panels for devotional and decorative use. And his work, mostly considering religious themes, had bold colours, sensitive characterisation and strong narrative force. 

Casting a soft shadow, a blue-cloaked Mary bows her head as she learns from an angel of her solemn destiny. The elderly King Melchior sets sail for the Holy Land to pay homage to the new-born Christ, a casket of gold on his knee. Watched by Constantine’s court, an ox collapses dead to the ground, having heard the secret name of God. 

Wandering around this small one-room show about a mostly forgotten artist, I found myself reflecting on the contemporary communications business.

King Melchior Sailing to the Holy Land by Francesco Pesellino.
Photograph: © Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA (1955.940)

The painting ‘Virgin and Child’ presents a familiar subject. But it is exquisitely executed and marks a fascinating development in Florentine art. A youthful Mary, with elegantly curled hair, tenderly supports her baby Jesus on the shoulder and side, as he looks mournfully out at us. Pesellino gave this picture crisp outlines. It was a prototype, a design to be copied and adapted multiple times, addressing the booming market for devotional images for domestic display.

Our industry today is obsessed with change and difference. We constantly reinvent, revamp and replace. But back in the day the Catholic Church understood the cognitive power of the repeated image: the mesmerising quality of a consistent motif, echoing across time and space, sustained by the nuances of theme and variation.

At the heart of the exhibition are two wide wooden panels depicting the story of David and Goliath – vibrantly coloured and richly decorated with gold and silver leaf. David, in violet tunic and pink cape, appears multiple times: tending his flock, refusing to don armour, collecting shot, attacking the nine-foot Philistine warrior Goliath with his sling; and then in the second panel standing atop a carriage in his triumphal procession, brandishing Goliath’s severed head by the hair. 

Francesco Pesellino (probably 1422–July 29, 1457), Museum of Fine Arts of Lyon

The panels are populated with elegantly attired foot soldiers and lance-wielding cavaliers; with dogs, falcons and a cheetah. The horses have opulent bridles and bejewelled reins. The ground is strewn with delicate flowers. The soldiers’ armour glistens in the light. 

I was struck by the episode in this story in which Goliath challenges the Israelites to choose one champion to face him in single combat, and so decide the war. I’m sure I read somewhere that this practice was quite popular in ancient times.

In the communications sector we expend vast amounts of time and money pitching for business. Even if we win, it usually takes a few years to recoup the loss. Wouldn’t it be more sensible if each agency simply nominated a creative champion to take on its competitors in single combat? 

Pesellino died of plague in Florence in 1457. He was just 35. Had he survived longer, perhaps he would have earned more than a page in Vasari’s ‘Lives of the Artists.’ And yet, like all great painters, his legacy is his work, and his ability to make us think.

'In my heart I will wait
By the stony gate,
And the little one
In my arms will sleep.
Every rising of the moon
Makes the years grow late,
And the love in our hearts will keep.
There are friends I will make
And bonds I will break,
As the seasons roll by
And we build our own sky.
In my heart I will wait
By the stony gate,
And the little one
In my arms will sleep.’
Joan Baez, ‘A Song for David'

No. 458

Impressionists on Paper: It’s Not What One Sees, But What One Can Make Others See

Edgar Degas. (Lyda (Woman with the spyglass)). 1869  ·  Gouache 

I recently attended an exhibition of works on paper by Impressionist and Post-Impressionist artists. (The Royal Academy, London until 10 March)

The show features drawings, pastels, watercolours, temperas and gouaches from the likes of Degas, Cézanne, Morisot and Van Gogh. And it looks at how these late nineteenth century revolutionaries changed the way we regard such work.

Traditionally subjects for French art were taken from literature, history, myth or religion, themes approved by the official Salon – an institution that sought to control practices and standards. Drawings were considered part of the process of training, preparatory studies to be left in the studio.

The Impressionists, by contrast, were interested in contemporary affairs; in light, colour and atmosphere.  They took their inspiration from nature, the city and modern life; from careful observation of real people. And they recognised that works on paper had their own particular creative merits. 

Employing new colours and portable paint materials, they adopted unusual viewpoints and recorded their direct spontaneous responses, with quick, light, economical touches and flourishes. Sometimes they deliberately left an image unfinished.

‘You will see that they are trying to create from scratch a wholly modern art, an art imbued with our surroundings, our sentiments, and the things of our age.’
Edmond Duranty, novelist and critic, 1876

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Woman with a black feather boa c1892

At the exhibition we visit the market stall, the café and the pawn bank; the theatre, the race track and the circus. We take a trip to the seaside, wander down to the riverbank and join the apple harvest. We ride with Giuseppe de Nittis in his rented carriage, a tactic he adopted to capture fleeting impressions of Paris on the move. 

We also meet a vivid cast of characters. Toulouse-Lautrec presents a glamorous young woman with a black boa and formidable stare. Degas introduces us to a lady in a formal silk dress who regards us through a pair of binoculars, a steadying hand on her elbow; and to a matron sitting at the window, lost in thought, only half there. 

There is a spirit of liberation and experimentation about this work. Degas tried drawing on coloured paper. On a mint green sheet he sketched a dancer with her hands behind her head as she stretches and yawns. On pink paper he outlined a ballerina bending over with her back to us - reduced to a light cloud of tulle floating over a pair of stockinged legs.

Edgar Degas, Dancer Seen from Behind

For the first time, works on paper were exhibited and sold, and became the subject of critical reviews and art publications.

‘Watercolour has a spontaneity, a freshness, a spicy brilliance inaccessible to oil… and pastel has a bloom, a velvety smoothness, like a delicate freedom or a dying grace, that neither watercolour nor oil can touch.’
Joris-Karl Hoysmans, novelist and critic, 1881

This exhibition is all about immediacy and intimacy. It shows how a relaxed and experimental approach to techniques and materials can convey freshness and vitality.

I found myself wondering whether we, in the world of commercial communication, have lost some of this freedom. Everything is so realistic and finished nowadays, so perfectly staged - even at concept phase. There seems little room for imagination.

It’s a shame. As Degas observed:

‘Drawing is not what one sees, but what one can make others see.’

'All I want to do is see you again.
Is that too much to ask for?
I just want to see your sweet smile,
Smile the way it was before.
Well, I'll try not to hold you and I'll try not to kiss you,
And I won't even touch you.
All I wanna do is see you,
Don't you know that it's true?’
Depeche Mode, 'See You’ (Martin Lee Gore)

No. 457

The Demise of the Procurator Fiscal: Navigating the Compromise Between Fate and Free Will

Paparazzi from the 1960 film La Dolce Vita

There was a TV news item when I was a teenager. I only half remember the details. Nonetheless I can’t forget it.

A crowd of journalists were badgering a senior Scottish legal officer who had recently resigned. There had been a scandal of some kind. The Procurator Fiscal seemed stiff, awkward, uncomfortable in the spotlight. He ignored their questions and made his way to a car. They persisted, jostling him and thrusting microphones in his face.

At length someone asked:

‘Did you jump or were you pushed?’

The lawyer paused for a moment and looked up:

‘I fell.’

And that was it. He retreated into his car and was gone.

Although I didn’t properly understand the context, I imagined there was a complex personal tragedy behind these words. And I had some sympathy for the outgoing Procurator Fiscal.

'Life calls the tune, we dance.'
John Galsworthy

Whenever something goes wrong in life, we all like to apportion blame; to allocate responsibility. Heads must roll. The guilty must be punished.

But often fortune has played a part in determining outcomes. We can be victims of circumstance; of bad luck, or a simple twist of fate.

'Life is a compromise between fate and free will.'
Elbert Hubbard

I encountered the same instinct to rush to judgement in the world of work.

When things went awry, management could be quick to compose a narrative about how we slipped and why we lost; to assign causes; to nominate scapegoats.

Of course, we should hold people accountable and we must learn from our mistakes.

But I confess I was never comfortable with inquests and investigations. I didn’t see the benefit in raking over the ashes, dwelling over disappointment.

'It's no good crying over spilt milk, because all the forces of the universe were bent on spilling it.'
Somerset Maugham

For the most part I preferred to move on, acknowledging the simple truth: we fell.

'They sat together in the park.
As the evening sky grew dark,
She looked at him and he felt a spark tingle to his bones.
’Twas then he felt alone and wished that he’d gone straight
And watched out for a simple twist of fate.’

Bob Dylan, ‘Simple Twist of Fate’

No. 456

Valentine’s Night: When Young Love Is Tongue-Tied and the Restaurant Experience Is Challenging

1950’s PAN AM Advertising Poster - Americans in London Resturant

The small local restaurant that I had booked for Valentine’s Night had been rearranged into neat, tight ranks of tables-for-two.

Though relatively full, it was quiet as my wife and I entered. But our arrival prompted turned heads and a low hum of debate and discussion. After a little while this died down and the awkward silence resumed. Until the next couple walked through the doors.

I deduced that the Valentines were struggling for conversation – young love can be tongue-tied - and that new diners at least provided a source of interest.

We settled down to our meal, which was rather good. But then the steaks turned up. My wife sampled hers and looked across at me in disappointment.

‘Is your steak OK? Mine’s completely tasteless.’ 

‘Well, it’s not great, but I’m sure it’ll be fine.’

I have an aversion to conflict. My wife on the other hand favours frank feedback. She summoned the young waitress.

‘Excuse me, can I have a word? I’m afraid my steak is completely lacking any flavour.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry, madam. I’ll talk to my manager.’

At this point a few of our fellow diners glanced up in our direction, delighted that they had some diversion. 

The senior member of staff was smart and professional. She adopted the HR crouch so that she could address us, sotto voce, on the same level.

‘I can promise you that our steaks are totally organic and locally sourced.’

‘I’m sure they are. But your chef should know that they have no flavour.’

I could sense that many eyes were now upon us. There was a continuous buzz of quiet commentary.

The manager chose to escalate the situation by summoning the chef from the kitchen. Looking none too pleased, he confirmed the exceptional quality of his meat.

‘Madam, we only buy the finest cuts. They’re ethically reared, hormone free and traceable.’

True to form, my wife held her ground.

‘I don’t doubt that at all. I’m sure everything about their provenance is beyond reproach. I’m not complaining. But I think you should know that your admirable steaks really have zero taste.’

By this time the whole restaurant was watching. We had become the evening’s entertainment. I shifted uneasily in my seat. I confess I found it all rather awkward

Of course, eventually peace was declared. Everyone agreed that the steak feedback was most welcome and that the exchange had been entirely worthwhile. Indeed we were given a free pudding - which only prolonged my discomfort.

At length we were able to beat a hasty retreat. And as we closed the door behind us I could hear the hum of commentary resume at a fever pitch.

So what lessons could I draw from our disappointing Valentine’s Night dinner?

From a professional perspective I learned that, if you want to attract disproportionate attention, you should consider an environment where people are bored, speechless or obligated.

On a personal level I concluded that you should never book a restaurant on Valentine’s Night.

'My funny Valentine,
Sweet comic Valentine,
You make me smile with my heart.
Your looks are laughable,
Unphotographable.
But you're my favorite work of art.
Is your figure less than Greek?
Is your mouth a little weak?
When you open it to speak,
Are you smart?
But, don't change a hair for me,
Not if you care for me.
Stay, little Valentine, stay.
Each day is Valentine's day.’

Chet Baker, ‘My Funny Valentine’ (Richard Rodgers / Lorenz Hart)

No. 455

The Graduate: ‘It's Like I Was Playing Some Kind of Game, But the Rules Don't Make Any Sense to Me’

Anne Bancroft and Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate 1967

Mrs. Robinson: Do you find me undesirable?
Benjamin: Oh no, Mrs. Robinson. I think, I think you're the most attractive of all my parents' friends. I mean that.

‘The Graduate’ is a 1967 movie that stars Dustin Hoffman as Benjamin Braddock, a college graduate who is uncertain about his future. He feels distant from the values and aspirations of his parents’ generation, and yet he’s not sure what he’s doing or where he’s going. It’s a film about alienation and ennui. And it still resonates today, as young people endeavour to preserve a sense of identity and independence in the face of convention and tradition; materialism and the need to make a living.

'Ladies and gentlemen, we are about to begin our descent into Los Angeles. The sound you just heard is the landing gear locking into place. Los Angeles' weather is clear, temperature is 72.'

‘The Graduate’ opens with 21 year-old Benjamin on a plane home to Los Angeles, returning from college in the east. The credits roll and we hear the haunting harmonies of Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘The Sound of Silence.’ 

‘And in the naked light I saw ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking, people hearing without listening.
People writing songs that voices never shared, no one dared disturb the sound of silence.’
Simon & Garfunkel, ‘The Sound of Silence.’ (P Simon)

With neat hair and wearing a suit and tie, Benjamin looks nervous, reflective, a little confused, as he stands on the travelator at LAX, passing white-tiled walls, accompanied by a repeated safety announcement.

‘Please hold the handrail and stand to the right. If you wish to pass, please do so on the left.’

He retrieves his single suitcase from the luggage carousel and exits the airport. Next we see him in his upstairs bedroom at his parents’ smart Pasadena home. Lying with his head next to the aquarium tank, he stares blankly ahead. Downstairs his parents and their friends have gathered to celebrate his graduation. His father comes up to chivvy him along.

Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate. Photo Courtesy of Embassy Pictures

Mr. Braddock: Hey. What's the matter? The guests are all downstairs, Ben, waiting to see you.
Benjamin: Look, Dad, could you explain to them that I have to be alone for a while?
Mr. Braddock: These are all our good friends, Ben. Most of them have known you since, well, practically since you were born. What is it, Ben?
Benjamin: I'm just...
Mr. Braddock: Worried?
Benjamin: Well...
Mr. Braddock: About what?
Benjamin: I guess about my future.
Mr. Braddock: What about it?
Benjamin: I don't know... I want it to be...
Mr. Braddock: To be what?
Benjamin: ... Different.

Eventually Benjamin sallies forth and is greeted with a series of congratulations, pats on the back and affectionate kisses. A middle-aged man puts his arm over his shoulder and takes him to one side.

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?

All at sea, Benjamin embarks on an affair with one of his parents’ friends. Mrs Robinson (played by Anne Bancroft) is glamorous, confident and droll. She is also bored, depressed and drinking too much. 

Benjamin: For God's sake, Mrs. Robinson. Here we are. You got me into your house. You give me a drink. You put on music. Now you start opening up your personal life to me and tell me your husband won't be home for hours.
Mrs. Robinson: So?
Benjamin: Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me!

We learn that when she was Benjamin’s age, Mrs Robinson had studied art at college. But having become pregnant by her student boyfriend, she found herself married and sentenced to a life of affluent tedium. And her cultural interests seemed suddenly entirely irrelevant.

Benjamin spends the summer drifting: secretly meeting Mrs Robinson in a bedroom at the Taft Hotel; driving around town in his red convertible Alfa Romeo Spider; floating on a lilo in his parents’ pool, an Olympia beer at his side. 

His father tries to rouse him to action.

Mr. Braddock: Ben, what are you doing?
Benjamin: Well, I would say that I'm just drifting. Here in the pool.
Mr. Braddock: Why?
Benjamin: Well, it's very comfortable just to drift here.
Mr. Braddock: Have you thought about graduate school?
Benjamin: No.
Mr. Braddock: Would you mind telling me then what those four years of college were for? What was the point of all that hard work?
Benjamin: You got me.

‘The Graduate’ is a fine movie: beautifully shot and crisply cut; wittily scripted and evocatively soundtracked. It established Hoffman as a star and director Mike Nichols as a new creative voice. It also gave us Anne Bancroft’s splendid portrayal of Mrs Robinson, a lost soul. 

We may recognise in Benjamin’s delusion and apathy something from our own youth: the concern that society’s values do not chime with ours; the discovery that the commercial and corporate worlds have little in common with the high-minded realms of academia; the fear that there are no fulfilling roles and opportunities available to us.

‘It's like I was playing some kind of game, but the rules don't make any sense to me. They're being made up by all the wrong people. I mean no one makes them up. They seem to make themselves up.’

Benjamin’s dilemma presents a challenge to present day leaders in the world of work: How do we motivate and inspire new generations? How do we give them a voice, recognise their difference and individuality? How do we convince them that it’s a game worth playing?

In the event Benjamin finds motivation and meaning when he falls in love with Mrs Robinson’s daughter, Elaine – a development that naturally precipitates complications.

At the film’s climax Benjamin dramatically persuades Elaine to leave her new, conventional, parent-approved husband standing at the altar. As she runs down the aisle past the aghast congregation, still in her wedding dress, she is confronted by her mother.

Mrs. Robinson: Elaine, it's too late!
Elaine: Not for me!

'And here's to you, Mrs. Robinson,
Jesus loves you more than you will know.
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
God bless you, please, Mrs. Robinson,
Heaven holds a place for those who pray.
Hey, hey, hey.
Hey, hey, hey.’

Simon & Garfunkel, 'Mrs. Robinson’ (P Simon)

No. 454

John Craxton: The Heroic Hedonist

Still Life Sailors (1980-85) Estate of John Craxton

I recently took the train to Chichester to see an excellent exhibition of the art of John Craxton. (Pallant House Gallery, until 21 April 2024)

Though born and raised in England, Craxton produced much of his work in Greece. There he portrayed an Arcadia of ordinary folk living under a hot sun, amongst olive trees and asphodels, wild cats and frolicking goats. He painted young men smoking in the morning, sleeping in the afternoon and dancing into the night. His art is full of colour, light and movement. It is a joyous celebration of life, and prompts us to consider our own attitudes to work and play.

‘As a child I enjoyed a happy, near-Bohemian home life in a large family.’

Craxton was born in London in 1922. When his father, a pianist and composer, scored his only hit - ‘Mavis,’ sung by the legendary Irish tenor John McCormack - he took his wife and six children down to Selsey on the south coast and bought a shack above the beach.

Craxton had an idyllic childhood.

‘In what now seems like a succession of endless, if not cloudless, summer days, I ran barefoot, rode ponies, shrimped at low tide, collected fossils from the Bracklesham Beds, went to the movies, carried milk from the farm (which still had a working windmill) and had family picnics on the beach.’

Craxton decided as a young boy that all he wanted was to be an artist. He attended various schools, but emerged with no qualifications. A naturally independent spirit, he didn’t fancy the discipline of formal creative training either. And so he was largely self-taught, occasionally dropping into art schools to pick up equipment and a little drawing tuition.

Boy on a Blue Chair, 1946 John Craxton

Having failed an army medical, Craxton was excused war service. Always rather charming, witty and spontaneous, he fell in with various sponsors, lovers and artists, and one patron funded a studio in St John’s Wood that he shared with Lucian Freud.

His early work featured quiet country lanes, twisted trees and dead animals; solitary souls in melancholy, menacing landscapes. During the war years he was given his first solo exhibitions in London, and was commissioned to produce book designs – a line of work that served him well for much of his life.

But Craxton was keen to get away from Britain. As a teenager he had been enchanted by the ancient Greek figurines and pottery he encountered at the Pitt-Rivers Museum in Dorset. He aspired to a Mediterranean idyll.

‘The willow trees are nice and amazing here, but I would prefer an olive tree growing out of a Greek ruin.’

John Craxton by Felix H. Man
bromide print, 1940s© estate of Felix H. Man / National Portrait Gallery, London

Immediately after the hostilities ended, there were still strict restrictions on travel. So Craxton and Freud embarked on a painting expedition to the Scilly Isles, and then stowed away on a Breton fishing boat bound for France. They only got as far as Penzance. 

The following year Craxton made it to Zurich, where he met the wife of a British ambassador at dinner. She offered him a lift to Athens in a bomber she had borrowed for a curtain-buying trip. 

And so, aged 23, Craxton arrived in Greece and immediately fell under its spell. He settled first in Poros, and then Crete, and he would stay there, on and off, for the rest of his life.

‘It’s possible to be a real person – real people, real elements, real windows – real sun above all. In a life of reality my imagination really works. I feel like an émigré in London and squashed flat.’

In Greece Craxton created romantic landscapes populated by shepherds, peasants and a pipe-playing Pan. He painted the azure sea and cyan sky; bare footed young men in white cotton trousers and striped tee shirts - working, relaxing, dancing arm-in-arm. His art has vibrant colours and a gentle cubism. And by contrast with his previous work, there’s an exultant spirit, a dreamy languor, a warm conviviality. We meet a rugged herdsman, a smoking butcher, a grey-bearded octopus fisherman. Here are moustached mariners tucking into a meal of seafood and salad at the local taverna. A sign on the wall behind them warns against breaking plates.

‘The most wonderful sound in the world is of people talking over a good meal.’

Craxton was fond of saying that 'Life is more important than art.’ He relished the freedom he had on the Greek islands - to ride his Triumph Trophy motorcycle along dirt roads and mountain tracks; to talk and laugh at the dockside bars, as he drank ouzo and feasted on cuttlefish and calamari; to lead an openly gay life. 

At the time Greece was a more tolerant place than Britain - although Craxton's interest in young men in uniform did prompt the authorities to suspect he was spying. When homosexuality was decriminalised in the UK in 1967, he sent the Home Secretary, Roy Jenkins, a picture.

As well as painting, Craxton designed book jackets for the travel writer Paddy Leigh Fermor; and created stage sets for Frederick Ashton at the Royal Ballet. But he was not particularly industrious. His friends joked that he suffered from ‘procraxtonation.’

Pastoral for PW John Craxton

Craxton suggests that a creative life need not be fuelled by anxiety and pain. It doesn’t have to be all about struggle and denial. Rather we can choose to follow our dreams; pursue our passions; seek out the sun. 

Craxton, who was made a British honorary consul in Crete, was never concerned by artistic fashion or the opinions of the establishment. He carried on painting in his own individual style into his later years, and he rode his motorbike until nearly 80. When he died aged 87, his ashes were scattered in Chania harbour. 

His biographer Ian Collins described him as ‘a heroic hedonist.’

 
'My life, my life, my life, my life in the sunshine.
Everybody loves the sunshine.
Sunshine, everybody loves the sunshine.
Sunshine, folks get down in the sunshine.
Sunshine, folks get 'round in the sunshine.
Just bees and things and flowers.
My life, my life, my life, my life in the sunshine.
Everybody loves the sunshine.
Feel, what I feel, when I feel, what I feel,
When I'm feeling, in the sunshine.
Do what I do, when I do, what I do,
When I'm doing, in the sunshine.
Sunshine, everybody loves the sunshine.'

Roy Ayers, 'Everybody Loves The Sunshine' 

No. 453

I Never Want to Go Out, I’m Always Glad I Did: Overcoming Inertia at Home and in Work

John Held Jr - Jazz Age

I have fallen in with an engaging crowd that regularly sees bands around London - usually small Americana outfits at characterful venues like Bush Hall and Dingwalls.

Towards the end of last year I attended a Goose gig at the Electric Ballroom in Camden. They presented admirably tuneful indie songs, laced with sprawling virtuoso guitar solos - the ghosts of the Grateful Dead.

The audience was for the most part young, knowledgeable, enthusiastic. The five of us stood towards the back, near the bar – nodding heads and making occasionally insightful observations.

Mid-way through the concert a tee-shirted American man in his thirties turned round and addressed us, with open smile and outstretched arms:

‘I just think this is fantastic. You guys, at your time of life, still getting out to see bands. Can I buy you a beer?’

We were insulted and delighted at the same time.

‘That’s very kind of you. I’ll have a pint of IPA please.’

As a senior citizen with more time on my hands nowadays, I go out in the evenings a good deal.

I have noticed that, as my theatre appointment, gig rendezvous or gallery reservation approaches, a fog of lethargy falls over me. I’ve been enjoying the comforts of home, the reassurance of a newspaper and a mug of sweet tea. Do I really want to brave the cold night air; to jump on a crowded tube; to conjure up conversation?

A kind of paralysis sets in.

'The heights charm us, but the steps do not; with the mountain in our view we love to walk the plains.'
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Then, eventually, propelled by guilt, self-censure and the fear of missing out, I don my artisanal jacket and make my way for the door. And I have consistently found that my languor and listlessness were unjustified. More often than not, my night on the town delivers.

Whilst I never want to go out, I’m always glad I did.

'Nothing happens until something moves.'
Albert Einstein

This phenomenon may be familiar to us in the world of work. Sometimes we get caught up in the inertia of established practices. We cling to the familiar and accustomed, postponing and prevaricating whenever a difficult decision is required. We find excuses not to try new things

And yet I have learned, in the course of my career, that whilst I never wanted to change, I was always glad I did.

'The reason men oppose progress is not that they hate progress, but that they love inertia.'
Elbert Hubbard

The tee-shirted American was true to his word and bought us each a beer. He also took a photo of us at the bar. On inspection, it’s fair to say we did look like an outing from the old people’s home.

To see ourselves as others see us…

 
'So my time will come
When I have the right mind.
Rid my mind of this hesitation,
Can't think why.
All I need is coming though.
It's not here quite yet.
Here I have seen the same thing,
Pretend not to mind it.
I'd like to be closer to me,
Or who I think I want to be.
Things change but you don't realize
You have all you need.’

Goose, ‘All I Need’ (R L Mitarotonda)

No. 452