In the Company of Memories

So I may have been premature with my gushing about Spring. In fact, I’m inclined to believe the weather is doing this deliberately; you really can’t rely on some meteorological phenomena to remain constant in behaviour. So it was with some trepidation that I peeked out at the weather the other morning, and promptly decided the best place to remain was under the duvet, and not in the freezing and frankly Dickensian looking morning. Unfortunately it was not to be, and I cursed loudly and in a very hyperbolic and passionate way that Spring was clearly not playing as I plunged into the streets of the capital for my meeting.

Houses of Parliament on a misty morning

It really is amazing how certain thoughts intrude as you’re pottering along. There is something about a grey day in London which always puts me in a reflective mood. There are ghost here, they peer out at us from dank, cobbled passages and soar over us in the cold and crisp air. Memories of lost friends, lost loves and lost beauty linger amidst the lofty glass towers, the traffic and the dust of this city, waiting to be seen and acknowledged again, waiting in vain it seems for the city to slow down enough for us to see one another.

St. Helen's, Bishopsgate - i love the unexpected pockets of history amongst the modern day, turn a corner and you're a millions miles away from the hustle and bustle of the city streets as we know them

That day I walked from Old Street to Green Park, then back along past Saint Paul’s and through to Moorgate before turning my feet home. I love walking in London, it’s such a refreshing change from the Tubes and Buses and it gives me time to think. My somewhat contemplative disposition was enhance by the weather and a certain nostalgia for times past, and it got me to pondering why it is that in a city which is so full of times past, it seems that it's the next big thing we’re always looking toward – after all, knowing where we’ve been must surely inform where we’re going to?

"History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time; it illumines reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life and brings us tidings of antiquity." Cicero, Pro Publio Sestio

Now, whilst this is perhaps no bad thing for the majority, being a student of history firstly, and art secondly, it really got me down – to the extent that I was starting to get somewhat distressed at our short-term, progressive view point. Geographically stumped as to my exact location, I was wandering (slightly) lost in a forest of glass and concrete towers, when suddenly I came across the most wonderful building which stopped me in my tracks. It’s funny how a small thing can have such a dramatic effect on ones subconscious, but this one really did – the St. Albans Church Tower – is what I would describe as a beacon in the dark, and it reminded me that there are some places in this city where the past and present merge with an image of the future to create something unique, something beautiful and something ineffably hopeful…

St. Albans Church, Wood Street - a welcome diamond in the rough

I’m putting it down to the Dickensian murk shrouding my brain – others may call it one of my blonde moments – but when I thought about it that day, and subsequently, there are many example of ghosts being made flash and blood amongst us. My favourite incarnation has to be the Sir John Soane’s Museum, Lincoln Inn Fields - a stone’s throw from the hustle and bustle of High Holborn. Soane (1753 – 1837) designed the house to live in, but also as a setting for his antiquities and his works of art. After the death of his wife (1815), he lived there alone, constantly adding to and rearranging his collections. It is the perfect place to spend an afternoon, a window onto the past enhanced by the fact that the museum is a house, a home, making it feel as if you have literally stepped back two hundred years, the hum of the modern world hushed to a mere memory.

Sir John Soane's Museum - the proverbial Aladdin's Cave, and a haven for getting away from it all

 Artistically though are there similar moments where past and present collide? Do we still yearn to see those men and women who inspired modern masters, or are they too dispatched to the realm of memory, languishing in museums populated by other ghosts? Shakespeare (brainy bard that he was) once wrote that “what is past is prologue”, and so it seems to me that to ignore the subtlety of past artists in favour of all the showmanship of today would be a great tragedy. Luckily the artistic community still recognizes the contribution of those who have held brushes before them; they recognize the value of images like Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, Jan Vermeer’s Girl with the Pearl Earring and Claude Monet’s famous Water Lilies series – if only grudgingly at times. Having been to the Da Vinci exhibition at the National Gallery, I have witnessed first hand the passion we still hold these artists in, and whilst they may not be seen in the most cutting edge of galleries, they are still a part of modern culture, if only as a footnote to the contemporary.

Jan Vermeer, Girl with the Pearl Earring, 1665. Oil on Canvas.

Whilst I guess in the end we’re all ghosts in this great metropolis – passing through, leaving memories for those who remember us and just another empty space for those who don’t – there seem to be some places where we can immerse ourselves in these spirits of bygone eras. Whether it’s walking through the streets or sitting quietly in a museum, I would council us to keep the company of these memoirs every now and again – not at the expense of the present you understand, but as a silent companion to it every once in a while.