Vivienne’s Diary – February

Thu 12 Feb: The first special event in February was a concert at the Festival Hall. My son Ben and his wife Tomaka invited us – Andreas and me. Tomaka learned piano in Japan from age 4 to 20, the flat was so small that her parents slept under the grand piano. The programme was French. First Mitsuko Uchida, a tiger poised to attack a Ravel piano concerto. Tomaka said: Other pianists settle down before the performance, ready for the beauty they will release; she knows exactly how she wants it to sound and she hits every note with the most precise accuracy.

Then Ravel’s “L’enfant et les Sortileges” (magic spells). This was a concert performance, orchestra on stage and singers each taking various roles and adapting their costumes – sometimes just with an accessory for each change of character. The story is of a naughty Boy (a young female soprano) stuck in the house, refusing to do homework (he hated Mathematics – one of the cast), thumbing his nose and pulling faces at “Maman” and angry at the household objects who came to complain about him: He had shredded the cloth of the Armchair with his heels, the Chinese Cup sings to the Mug, “How’s your mug?”, they are scared of him breaking them; he tortures the Squirrel in its cage and plays with Fire. The naughty Boy’s room was on a level high behind the orchestra but all singers wandered freely – mostly in front of the orchestra. In a concert performance the décor and acting seem especially spontaneous and lively, because they engage with the presence of the orchestra.

Ravel is ingenious; he charms and dazzles, so French, so chic: spiritually exhilarating.

Ravel’s desk photographed in his house in Monfort

The story comes from Collette. As a young woman Collette was the pet of French intellectuals. The story of her adolescence in the country and her growing up, the Claudine novels caused a sensation. If you want to embrace the frenchness of France at the time of the Belle Epoque – Picasso, Renoir, Chanel, Offenbach, Proust, Rimbaud, Josephine Baker, Cocteau – the list is endless; Bohemia, the Salons – read Collette. This was the western world at the peak of its intellectual output. It was said, “When good Americans die, they go to Paris.”

Sun 22 Feb: The Red Label collection was delivered in good time which gave us plenty of time to put the show together and enjoy it. Murray organized this and he had worked with our jewellers to make the most super punk jewellery and suggested punk as a theme for the hair and make-up. I always like it to look like the girl did it herself. The models loved it.

I wrote about the Red Label girl on the press release.

 Red Label Autumn- Winter 2015/16

The girl who wears Red Label – I want to tell you about her, she’s a bit like me. She was lucky enough to be born in the country and she moved with her family to London when she was 17. She knows the names of all the trees and she’s always been a reader. Since she’s been in London she’s gone to the museums all the time. She’s an art lover and she really thinks culture is very, very important. If we had true culture we would not be in the situation we’re in. Culture has been replaced by consumption- which is quite a different thing.
At the moment we are controlled by 1% of the world population who are in power. They preach consumption, and they preach war, and they’re taking us into disaster. We are in incredible danger.
There is no point in voting for the others. She is going to vote Green.

The rest of the month:  I was busy still designing the Gold Label with Andreas. For intellectual food I was slowly working my way through Macbeth. I was in bed where I am happiest. Just a few lines at a time. Shakespeare is poetry at its most profound and I am possessed by the need to understand it completely.

This next quote is an observation regarding a king and difficult to pin down. (But amazingly you do understand it in a performance).

Duncan is saying, the love you give me is a burden but I accept it as love and you must ask god to reward me for the pleasure you get in expressing your love (a king’s job). Lady Macbeth then flatters King Duncan in her formal welcome. There is something equivocal here: He makes a point of telling Lady Macbeth he accepts her love as sincere, although he (probably) and she, know it is a formula.

Why does Shakespeare need to have Duncan make such a reply? Perhaps to intrigue and flatter a real king (James I.). By voicing the unusual but everyday thoughts of a King, Duncan rudely but amiably establishes his superiority. We are intrigued and regard him as a real-life individual which makes us feel the play is a real-life drama happening before our eyes. If Macbeth kills him, he will kill a man we now know.

Shakespeare must have got this thought from somewhere – by collecting other thoughts and experience. Invention is about making connections (and it is also how an individual gains knowledge). His drama was a way to make use of these thoughts; put this idea together. (What I have just described is the imagination at work.)

I mention this quote for another reason. It applies to me. I am recognized and people ask me for a photo and sometimes a signature. This is usually a pleasure – to say hello to someone and it only takes a minute. Twice I’ve said no and have regretted it. And I did it again: I went for a walk over the common with Andreas the night before the Red Label show and we went in the ice-cream parlour. There were six or seven girls of age ten or eleven. They were the sweetest and loveliest little things on earth but one of them recognized me and asked for a photo. I was feeling a bit stressed (worrying about the Gold Label) and I suddenly felt I couldn’t cope with engaging with so many children and being the focus of everybody else in the parlour. I just got up and walked out – I have to go! When we got home I felt so upset with myself that Andreas said, let’s go back. I thought, it’s too late, they wont’ be there. I should have done, anyway. I was miserable for two days.

What makes Shakespeare so profound is that he feels humans are part of the cosmos. Our ambition keeps us wilfully ignorant of our truly human potential.

Time and horror fuse together as one. So intense is the focus of his energy that all other energy zooms into it. Stones are energy, Time is energy, perhaps everything is energy. The horror of his crime will be trapped in this courtyard forever. (This is one of the explanations for ghosts, a medium being a receiver of this energy.)