Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan's Blog, page 13

Today in Photo

Leaving Berlin again next week for my endless visa run life which I have apparently chosen instead of staying put and calm in Delhi like any sensible person. 🙄 However much of a wrench it is to leave one life just when I'm settling in, I'm still looking forward to Life Two in Delhi and before that, a short holiday in Budapest and Turkey. Nice, maybe, to dangle between two sets of homes and friends and family but not so nice to be long distance for a month or so while I settle the paperwork and K goes back to take care of the cats. #berlinna #goodbyeagain #helloagain #traveldiaries

via Instagram

What I'm Reading

Have read lots recently but nothing worth commenting on, I thought, except for these two. If you've never read E. Lockhart before, don't start with this one (begin with The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks for an idea of her style, then go on to We Were Liars which I'm not telling you anything about except read it) and once you have CONTEXT, then read this which is scam artist, con woman x 500, it's really good and will keep you entertained. The second book I'm recommending is Woman In Black by Susan Hill which is a classic old fashioned ghost story, scary as fuck, short too, so you can read it in one afternoon or between ten and midnight like I did, then desperately cast around for something more soothing to send you off to sleep. (I settled on a Tudor novel, my comfort read of choice.) Anyway! Sometimes books just aren't ¬meaningful¬ enough to post about which is why the long silence but hopefully it'll pick up now. #thewomaninblack #susanhill #elockhart #genuinefraud #bookstagram #mrmbookclub #100in2022

Today in Photo

K's mum is in town and she got herself a hotel room with the best view of Berlin. #tvtower #alexanderplatz #upintheair

via Instagram

Today in Photo

Old friends back in town. I did his picture and he did mine. 😁 @sarnathbanerjee #sketchbook

via Instagram

Today in Photo

Had a very hard time getting my Famous Five t-shirt into the frame so you can see the writing. Part of the set of bookish kid lit t-shirts K made me in Delhi before we left but have never managed to photograph it properly so here we go! Used an old illustration blown up. Wore to a book discussion group gathering yesterday which felt appropriate. #whatiworetoday

via Instagram

Today in Photo

[image error]
I super prolifically wrote TWO newsletters this past week then got too distracted to promote them so here they both are. Swipe to see excerpts. The first two are about turning forty the second two about a trip I took to an art gallery, some snarky commentary, some art history. As always, link in bio or mrm.substack.com to read all of it. #theinternetpersonified #newsletter

via Instagram

The Internet Personified: A tour of the Gemäldegalerie

Hi!

Bonus newsletter this week because I went to the Gemäldegalerie (museum of paintings, old masters etc) and I had a great time just focussing on the little details of some of the artwork so I could tell you all about it. Mostly it was to make fun of it and make us both laugh, but then I started to research the history behind the images and it turned out to be quite fascinating so I’ve included little nuggets of that for you too. Not usual content, no, so go ahead and delete it if it’s not your thing.

In the amazing years of portraiture, you could “sit” for a portrait and choose exactly what sort of pose and angle and background you wanted, so the incredible thing about this picture is that this guy CHOSE IT ON PURPOSE. Like he really thought his pointy little tongue coming out of his mouth like that represented him as a great and noble man. You’d think otherwise that the artist had a grudge against this guy, but seeing as it is a picture of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, I think that sort of grudge would be pretteee dangerous.

Charles’ dad was called Philip the Handsome (of Hasburg) and his mother was (sadly) called Joanna the Mad (of Trastamara) so those were the genes handed down to him. Anyway there’s a lot of history stuff about this guy (wars and so on) so you can look that up if you feel so inclined, but here are three (3) salient facts about his life:

a) he was born in a bathroom because his mother went to a ball even though she was so pregnant she had already started labour.

b) he actually wrote up the charter that said slaves could be transported directly from Africa to America without stopping first in Portugal or Castile, so that changed a lot for the transatlantic slave trade.

c) One of his mistresses was his step-grandmother.

So… yeah.

I only took this photo because while it is a very gory representation of a post-Crucifixion scene it is also the most accurate representation of a hangover I’ve ever seen. I love everything about it. I can’t find out anything about it despite running it through a reverse image search so we can just admire it out of context. Look at that downturned mouth, that blue and red wound in his side.

Just looking at this face again makes me want to laugh. Also gotta love the careful handkerchief places in front of the cherub’s nethers, a cherub who is trying very hard to present said nethers to you—all spread thighs and concerned face.

This is from a painting called The Rest on the Flight to Egypt, another Biblical story, and it was painted by a guy called Lucas Cranach the Elder. Him and Martin Luther were super tight, and thanks to this friendship, Cranach had a lot of powerful patrons, including a duke who gave him the exclusive printers copyright to the Bible (!!!) and also said he was the only guy who could sell medicines in Wittenberg.

The Nazis really loved his stuff—so much so that they looted nearly all of it, killing Jewish owners and collectors to get to them. Even Hitler “owned” one of his paintings, surprisingly not a Bible scene but one called Cupid Complaining to Venus (below) featuring a super naked and quite sexy Venus. (It always surprises me that none of these naked models have pubic hair: did the artists only use pre-pubescent women or did they paint without hair and then not know what to do with the labia, leaving it in a smooth triangle not unlike a Barbie doll?)

This artist had clearly never seen a woman before so just drew a muscular man and added two small round breasts. This was from a section of the museum called “Fantastic Beasts” and this is apparently a maiden (?) being frightened by a griffin while behind her, her other friends from gym frolic. I like that she’s completely naked except for her fancy sandals and two long chain necklaces and also that she’s holding a stick thing to keep the beast at bay, while at the same time looking only slightly annoyed, like “oh good lord, what now, why can’t I go back to focussing on leg day?”

Question: do angels fart? Because this photo (of a photographic reproduction of a Jan Van Eyck painting) is very clearly showing one of the angels smelling a fart. She’s like, “Okay, I’ll keep holding this note but what is that smell? Is it Corinthea? I told her angels don’t eat turnips.” Corinthia being the one in front, of course, whose slight frown shows her bearing down on her fart.

You already know Van Eyck, but the guy who is responsible for this picture (and many others) being in the Gemäldegalerie was a collector called Edward Solly, who so indiscriminately bought art that there’s a quote hanging over his section of the museum that basically says apart from 10 or 15 pieces most of the other stuff is pure JUNQUE.

Not this piece though. It’s part of the Ghent altarpiece (now returned to Ghent) (Solly sold most of his collection to the Prussian king, which was his plan all along). These angels were specifically drawn un-angel-like, so no wings or halos, so that you, the church goer, could identify with them. Which is nice. We’re so apt to think of history as something that happened to alien people, a long time ago, that sometimes we forget they were human too, prone to fidget or think unworthy thoughts. Or I guess look at some angels on an altarpiece and want to be more like them.

Obviously I had to zoom into this dog and this cat in the foreground of this painting. Either the dog is very small or the cat is very large and really, there’s no way this giant cat would just lie on its side and snarl when the dog was bothering it so I’m just concluding this is one of those fanciful details the painter added because he needed to fill some empty space.

This artist actually loved to draw cats. His name was Gabriel Metsu and he was constantly chucking cats into his pictures, including this one which is meant to be a family portrait but your eyes are distracted from the family because of the dog and the cat right in front of them. There’s not much more available about his life apart from the basic details, but he did like cats.

Ages ago, I did a little post on time travel where I posited that I’d stay hidden from people by posing as a maid or an ayah, and I used this painting as an illustration. So when I saw it hanging there I was thrilled, like meeting an old friend.

Two more interesting things about this painting (the first interesting thing being my own history with it, of course). The first is that this subject, this nanny, was actually named in the portrait so that is unusual and rare, and suggests she had a personal connection with the family. (Her name is Clarinda.) The second is that the vampiric-looking child she’s cradling so tenderly is Jane Austen’s cousin Eliza, who was actually Jane’s model for the character of Mary Crawford in Mansfield Park (the only character worth reading that book for, in my humble opinion.)

Clarinda is extremely beautiful in the manner of a Raja Ravi Varma portrait and I wish we knew more about her, how she came to be named (and painted at all in the family portrait) and also what’s the story with all her jewellery, but alas, all is lost to the mists of time.

Gotta love this lady and how lovingly she’s holding her ridiculous looking dog. “See my pug,” she’s saying with a smug smile. She’s really proud of it!

This is a copy made by an artist called Anna Dorothea Therbusch of a painting by Antoine Pesne of his daughter with her dog, I guess? I don’t know why Anna decided to copy this picture, she was a very talented artist in her own right and made many original paintings so why this random one of a woman with her dog? Did she even know the Pesnes? Did she like this girl so much that she had to own her image? Or is this just one of her copies that survives: smug girl with pug?

Finally, here is a baby. It’s meant to be the Holy Family I think, but come on. Its weird little toes, its strangely creepy expression, its much-too-tight outfit, this is the kind of baby that you’d have to search for other compliments for if you met it the first time. (Eg: “oh, I love his….necklace!”) This kid looks like he should be named something with many syllables. Chiranveer. Mrityuanjay. You know?

This is a very long letter about art from someone who really doesn’t know much about art, so you are totally welcome for all my great information. Talk soon!

If you liked this, I’d love if you shared it WIDELY. Thank you!!

Share

xx

m

Who are you? Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan, writer of internet words (and other things) author of seven books (support me by buying a book!) and general city-potter-er.

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. (Plus my book recommendation Instagram!)

Got sent this newsletter? Sign up here to subscribe!

Forward to your friends if you liked this and to authors of newsletters that bombard you with two long emails in one week if you didn’t.

Also, write back to me! I love to hear from you.

Today in Photo

You can take the cat out of Delhi but can you take Delhi out of the cat? Everyone in Berlin is like "omg THREE continuous days of sun, what is this sorcery?" and I'm like "duh it's February? That's what happens in February." which goes to show I may not be AS acclimated to winter here as I thought I was. Either way, sunny days are a gift. #catsofberlin

via Instagram

Today in Photo

Some photos from our night walk yesterday. Walked to the museum via Brandenburger Tor and Tiergarten. Went to Sarvanaa Bhavan for dinner (yes pretty good! Apparently all the franchises have to use only Sarvanaa trained chefs who all go through the training in a central kitchen so the food tastes consistent across countries and restaurants. I know this because I asked the waitress. The Berlin SB serves drinks which is SHOCKING 😱 but also delightful.) then checking out the Berlinale screening area, the Französisch Dome and some night sights. A good 7.8 kilometres but somehow doesn't feel like exercise if you're just strolling along city streets. (Still pretty cold and windy but we're bundled up.) #berlinna #citywalks

via Instagram

The Internet Personified: On forty

Hallo, my schmink tisches!

I am a Sagittarius. Two of my closest friends are too—one born the same day I was, the other one day later. (Different years for all.) We are all three very different people: my friends—who are not friends with each other, to clarify, just with me—are organised, hard-working and think nothing of giving up pleasure so they can finish a long hanging task. One loves activity and the outdoors. One loves cozy gatherings, preferably long lazy lunches. I am like neither of them, tending to indolence, supremely self-indulgent, willing to be late to something so I can take a nap. I like crowded rooms, and smoky dive bars. If given a choice, I’d live in a big city for the rest of my life, not setting a toe even in the countryside, except for maybe a weekend sometime in summer if I was feeling Romantic about Nature. If we are all three Sagittariuses, which of us is the most Sagittarius? I spent my teen years reading about our zodiac sign, like it would explain me to me.

OK FINE but this could be anyone also

I think about being Sagittarius when I’m faced with new situations. I think, “Maybe I am reacting to this like this because of my zodiac sign.” It’s a comforting thought: nothing has to do with me, everything has to do with the stars.

But more likely—actually probably—the reason I am reacting the way I do is because of things that have happened to me before. You’re always learning, always checking things off a giant list you don’t even know you’re keeping.

When I turned forty in December, I wasn’t really thinking about it. For many years previous, probably since I was about 37, I’d been thinking vaguely about “going all out” for my fortieth birthday. I thought Goa at the time, lying lazily on a beach, being given a cocktail, surrounded by people I loved. I could see the night, glitter across bare shoulders, plunging low cotton dresses, in-jokes and puckered mouths from too much to drink. I’d have to do a little navigating because my friends are such a mixed bunch it is sometimes unwise to mix everybody and hope they get along, but I’d been hoping that the distance would make awkwardness less important, that love would hold us all together. And then the pandemic happened, and of course, everyone’s plans changed, including mine. Instead of warm sunny Goa, I’d be in cold icy Berlin, instead of being surrounded by people I loved, I’d hoped (but not very hopefully, the pandemic has cured me of unbridled optimism) that a few friends would be able to make it, and when they weren’t, I was just glad that K and I were together, starting a new adventure.

I could have stayed in Delhi, you know. My birthday was just one week after we left, there was no tearing hurry to make us leave the city when we did. But though I was willing to compromise on a bunch of things, my vision of forty always involved somewhere else. I wanted to wake up in the morning and be elsewhere. Not at home in Delhi, but in a strange place, with the sun shining (or not) differently, with a whole unexplored land in front of me. I didn’t want to be in our Delhi flat organising booze and food as I always did for my birthdays. I just wanted to be elsewhere, opening my eyes on a new decade with a new start.

One of K’s friends was in town, so we went out and got some pizza and some glühwein and then we went home and the next day we had to put Bruno to sleep and this was hanging over my head the entire time so I wasn’t able to abandon myself to birthday feelings at any rate. I wanted to do something because you know, you only turn forty once, but I couldn’t celebrate with all the joy in my heart because our cat was dying.

So I suppose that was my first introduction to this new decade. Sorrow and joy. Pushing through and yet not pushing yourself so much that you can’t handle it.

K and I started dating just a few months before I turned thirty. At twenty nine, I was already weary of the Game, I wanted in the words of Portishead: a reason to be a woman. And we were very quickly, very into each other. Love happened like quicksand, a slow enveloping of all your body until you realise you’ve surrendered to it. I’m glad we met then, both of us reaching our slowing down years at the same time, both of us ready to fall in love, both of us open to what was next.

I mention this because at forty, I have already been with someone for ten years. At forty, I already decided with my partner several years ago that neither of us was very interested in having children. So my waning fertility affects me in that I am sad that these are my last few years of being a “functional woman” so to speak. So silly to assume fertility is tied up with your sense of being a woman. But ours was the first generation to buck tradition and settle down and be childfree all together. I have a friend one generation older who also chose to eschew parenthood, but in my own generation, a majority of my friends are childfree, it’s such a common choice that we don’t even feel the need to discuss it any more. At forty, I doubt anyone will ask “So when are you having kids?” because those years are nearly behind me, I’m almost done with the whole rigmarole. I feel free now to admire children, to think they are cute when they walk past me on the road, to smile at mothers with babies, to be delicate about peoples struggles with fertility instead of just shrugging my shoulders (“kids are overrated anyway.”) or very quickly offering a list of options for things they could do instead of trying IVF or whatever. I understand now that as we begin our slow march towards death—as we begin to be aware of our slow march towards death—it’s nice to think your life has meaning to someone else.

Because the truth is, I am halfway through my life. If I lived till 80, this would be the 50% mark. We can change some things about our physical circumstances, but stuff: body stuff, health stuff, all that boring talk which is now endlessly fascinating to all of us, it’s never going to get better. Just “not as bad as it could be.” (Unless of course you are the exception to this rule and you were very ill in your teens and twenties and now you are the picture of health and vitality.)

I look young for forty. I’m not even saying this to show off, what a thing to show off about, something I have no control over. My hair is still black, no greys. My face is round and I have plump cheeks, so no hollowness there. If you look closely at my face you’ll see lines around my eyes and mouth. If you compare photos of me now to photos of me ten, fifteen years ago, you’ll see I’ve aged quite a lot, but people don’t generally walk around with a photo of themselves at 27, ready to show you. I haven’t been sleeping very well recently, so for the first time in my life, I have dark circles under my eyes, something I used to long for as a teenager, so I’d look mysterious and gloomy. Now it just looks like I didn’t wash my eye make-up off in the night. I have friends of all ages, and when, inevitably, the conversation rolls round to age, I often don’t participate. I’ll say “Oh I’m too old to XYZ” but this is usually at a social situation and usually because I don’t want to sit up any longer. Take it from a forty year old, if you’re not having fun at eleven pm, it’s very unlikely you’ll suddenly start having fun at 2 in the morning.

But no, a lot of people I know like to use their age as a way to say what they can and can’t do. Too old to get a radically new haircut or quit their jobs and do something creative like they’ve always wanted or make new friends and so on. When I was leaving Delhi, at our leaving drinks, one of my friends leaned in and said, “Aren’t you scared about doing this at forty? Starting your life again?” and she was nice enough to frame it as a question, but I’m sure a lot of people thought I was completely nuts to just give up on everything (we owned a flat for god’s sake!) and leave. I told them all it was because we had no children, which is true, no other schedules to please except our own, but it was more than that. It was about, I think, reaching that halfway mark of your life, and not wanting the rest of it to look exactly the same.

Gloria Steinem famously said to a journalist who told her, “But you don’t look forty!” “This is what forty looks like.” And that was a great solid answer. But I’m scared, with everything I’ve read about women becoming erased from society because they’re no longer sexually viable or whatever, that this will happen to me. I don’t want to be a sexual object, you understand. I just don’t want to become invisible. The third stage of femalehood: the maiden, the matron and the crone.

But forty today is no longer what it used to be. We could be thirty two or twenty six or nineteen, just with forty years of living on this planet behind us. Which is nice. Think of living all that again.

Share

Iffff you liked this post,

Let’s make a toast!

Buy me a coffee,

So I can keep talking(ee)

Sorry. But here’s a tip jar, you do you, donations much appreciated.

buy me a coffee!!

LINKSLINKSLINKS

My last Voice of Fashion column was about RK Narayan’s horn-rimmed glasses.

Twenty famous writers on why rejection was the best thing that ever happened to them if you need a pick-me-up.

The problem with designer dogs (so PLEASE don’t go to a breeder, adopt a stray puppy instead na?) (I say puppy but I really mean kitten.)

What went wrong at Westland. (And if this is BRAND NEW information for you, my book of short stories Before, And Then After will be pulped with the rest of Westland’s stock in April I think? Going to see if I can find someone new to take it on, but it’s last chance for a while to buy it considering it’s a) short stories and b) previously published. Not linking because I’m pissed with Amazon right now but I know it’s a convenient way to buy and sell books, so not judging you for buying it wherever you can. Remember: BEFORE, AND THEN AFTER. It’s really good.)

Loved this: best pop culture moments from 2002.

Also loved this about Patpargunj, my old hood.

And that’s all I’ve got for you this fine Thursday morning. Be good and if you can’t be good, be careful.

Love and other indoor sports,

m

Who are you? Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan, writer of internet words (and other things) author of seven books (support me by buying a book!) and general city-potter-er.

Follow me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. (Plus my book recommendation Instagram!)

Got sent this newsletter? Sign up here to subscribe!

Forward to your friends if you liked this and to lower back pains that emerge out of nowhere as soon as you are over thirty five if you didn’t.

Also, write back to me! I love to hear from you.