Hands up who started Lockdown and said something like “Right, I’m going to use this time to be productive. I’m going to learn a language”. Come on, be honest. I’ve still got a bass guitar propped up against a bedroom wall which is performing a valuable function as a dust storage unit.
Graham Cameron was a little more productive. He took the time to produce a series of illustrations that looked at his lockdown and the impact of Covid-19 on the arts. He took inspiration from his surrounds and created illustrations of the famous landmarks, including the Palace Pier, the Royal Pavilion and the Dome. “I’ve worked at Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival for 21 years, and during furlough I re-connected to the other version of me – the artist. I found myself drawing everyday as a way to express how the pandemic was personally affecting me but also how I saw the outside world unfolding from the safety of my lockdown caravan.”
As part of the exhibition, Cameron’s original artwork and digital prints will be for sale via an online auction, with a 10% donation from each purchase made to Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival’s charity.
The Art of G
Brighton Dome Founders Room, Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE
11am – 3pm, 26 – 31 October 2021
Free admission
Details of the online auction will be released on Brighton Dome website: brightondome.org
What JOY to get back to the Dome last night to have a good old laugh with the brilliant Fi Glover and Jane Garvey. And thanks to the millennial media star Pandora Sykes as host for inadvertently proving just how much funnier, wittier, sharper women get with a little life behind them. As Fi and Jane regaled us with tales from their book “Did I Say That Out Loud” and reminded us of the best bits of their hilarious podcast, “Fortunately”, it was what good theatre is all about. Sharing a giggle about the menopause, a campaigning fist pump about equal pay and a tear about the realities of divorce is just so much better in the flesh.
It’s part of Fane Productions’ fabulous series of author talks – Stanley Tucci, Eileen Atkins, Grayson Perry, Nigella Lawson to name just a few are coming up this autumn – and although they’ve done a wonderful live streaming job through the Pandemic, it’s so good to be back.
I ’m sitting outside a café in south west France, taking a break from exploring the beautiful 13th century market town of Revel. I’m sipping a café au lait, and trying to avoid being completely consumed by the fug of cigarette smoke billowing at me from all directions.
Seven Dials has its problems – traffic, mainly – but industrial scale fag smoking is a rare hazard.
The elderly chap sitting next to me, puffing furiously on a hand-rolled cigarette, attempts to engage me in conversation. My French is not brilliant, his English marginally better. He asks what I’m doing in this part of France. I’m on a kind of road trip I say, punctuated by lots of cycling and going off road into the unknown. I gesture peddling and he nods, and then I fear he’s about to expire on me as he launches into yet another huge coughing fit.
After a suitable longuer while he recovers his breath, the old fella asks me if I’ve ever read Jean-Paul Sartre. I nod and say yes I have read most of his fiction, but it was a long time ago. Quarante ans, I say, thinking, gosh, was it really so long ago. But then I think, wow, things are looking up. You don’t really get this class of conversation outside Small Batch.
He was, said the old boy, gazing steadily at me, un “existentialist, oui?”
Yes, I said, he was one of the first I suppose. More nodding, more coughing. Yes, he concurred, one of the first. More silence, possibly existential.
I’m thinking, how do I follow that one? Should I say I’ve also read Camus? La Peste, appropriately… I think better of it.
We’re sitting underneath a beautiful 13th century archway, looking out into the Market Square. It’s around midday and approaching 28° or thereabouts. It’s a clear blue sky, and the French are getting ready for their favourite past time… eating. They are pioneers in many areas – cinema, philosophy… art, of course. But I’d say when it comes to chowing down the French have few peers.
Reverential silence descends on the tables of fellow diners, while mountains of frites and various local fish stew type concoctions are devoured. I wonder how they manage to eat so much in the middle of the day. It’s quite extraordinary.
And then go back to work? But being as this is late August, most of the people wolfing down their midday meals are I daresay on holiday. Hence the copious volumes of local vin rouge and rose perched on rickety table tops. Most agreeable, I think. A very, very French scenario.
What’s also noticeable is the absence of any Brits. On the long drive down from Dieppe via Le Mans and Bordeaux, I barely saw a GB registration plate. When I shared this with my elderly companion at the table, he nodded and shrugged…pas d’Anglais. No Brits down here for at least a year. It’s regrettable, he said. We rather liked having you around. His deeply creased countenance cracked into a broad, toothless grin. It’s kind of weird this lack of Brits.
I have to say, to misquote Robert Heinlein in Stranger in a Strange Land ‘the only familiar is the unfamiliar.’ It feels really weird, having spent several weeks of the year in France for many years now, this is the first time I can ever recall feeling like something of an alien. Of course, the pandemic is largely responsible, but I know that many people who would normally be spending a few months of the year down here are now no longer able to do so, thanks to the restrictions of Brexit. And I find myself once again becoming irritated at the very thought of the millions of people who voted us out of Europe. Selfish, myopic, looking out for number one, you name it… They have conspired to deprive many of our citizens of our previous rights to roam freely in this great continent.
Personally, I’m fortunate, in that I have dual nationality. My mother was Irish, and I have an Irish passport. I am a European citizen, thank God. I also give thanks to the fact that my children will be able to eventually secure their own Irish passport. Currently, I’m in no rush to get back to the UK. The irony of hearing the last night of the Proms, the ‘land of hope and glory’, cannot be lost on many of those who helped to edge us out. What hope? What glory? As my coffee companion says with another Gallic shrug…Je ne sais pas. Je ne sais pas du tout.
I first met Omar Alibhoy back in 2018 at Westfield in Shepherds Bush where his first Tapas Revolution spread itself confidently across the heart of the shopping centre, its stools at the long bar treating casual shoppers to its signature dry-aged ham and other classic Iberian tapas. Omar told me that he’d brought his brand to Britain because while Spain may be a home from home to millions, who even knows how to make calamares? Not that that’s what most visitors to Tapas Revolution are interested in as they tuck into a small pate of Fritura Mista, but Omar is, and that’s what makes this Revolution different to most.
His book Spanish Made Simple is just that, and according to friends who love to cook Spanish food, it’s one of the best on the market. But whether or not you’re a home cook who loves to play with different cultures on the plate, it’s this that flavours the eating experience at Brighton’s North Street restaurant which opened earlier this summer.
Now, full disclosure here; I know just how much Omar cares about detail because my daughter was part of the opening team (and is now a supervisor), and spent two weeks learning exactly what a Spanish welcome should be, the story behind the food and how to mix a mean Margerita. That bonding with the largely Spanish crew created a family feel which anyone who knows anything about Spain will know is the real meat on the table.
And so to the food. Dining with the legendary Brighton food critic, Andrew Kay (below) was always going to be a treat, but I was wary about the torreznos con mojos, the slow cooked pork belly drizzled with a herb mojo verde and sweet spicy sauce and the chorizo a la sidra, a spicy Asturian sausage roasted with red onion and vintage cider reduction. Spanish food culture has had the pig at its centre for generations, yet as in Italy, the slow creep of the factory farm has already begun to erode its roots. Would Omar care enough about bringing his Spanish food culture to Britain to pay for high welfare, locally sourced pig? I didn’t dare ask.
It was delicious, a melt in the mouth, knife through butter dish which I left Andrew to finish, just in case, while I devoured the guisantes con jamon, a delightful plate of garden peas with mint, confit onion, slow roasted garlic and jamon. I might have left the jamon on the side… The garbanzos y espinacas, the vegan braised chickpeas with baby spinach, garlic and spices was a safer bet, and a tasty and moreish option to the usual runners and riders of patatas bravas and calamares A couple of glasses of white Rioja, a table on the terrace in the sunshine, and that was a Friday lunchtime I shall do again.
The million-pound Seven Dials Roundabout which was re-designed in 2013 and has been repeatably closed for costly repairs and further re-design since is breaking up yet again. The initial budget was exceeded by more than 50% and now confidence in the so-called experts from the highways department is crumbling as fast as the roundabout itself. The initial 2013 design was claimed to improve road safety until a picture was published of an articulated truck driving over the pavement in front the Small Batch Coffee shop.
The highways engineers had omitted to include bell bollards in their design! Several of these bell bollards were then hastily positioned on the pavements and now, at least, offer some protection to both pedestrians and buildings. When the 2013 design started breaking up, the height of the cobbled “outer island” was reduced and the kerbstones re-laid. It then became obvious that this levelling of the cobbled outer island with the tarmac lane surrounding it undermined (in more ways than one) the rationale of the roundabout itself which was to keep all traffic except HGVs and buses (which needed more space for turning) on the single lane of tarmac!
Now that the original raised kerb has been removed cars and motor bikes routinely cut cross the cobbled surface, increasing the likelihood of collisions and threatening the safety of pedestrians who, incidentally, were encouraged by the highway engineers in 2013 to practise “informal crossing” (i.e., not to use the zebra crossings). The same highways engineers had also wanted to chop down the 130-year-old elm tree, claiming that this was essential for the implementation of the design.
This crazy destruction of a perfectly healthy elm tree (part of the national collection) was fortunately prevented after thousands signed a petition and two daring residents camped in the branches of the tree to stop tree cutters in their tracks whilst the Council reconsidered its decision. The irony of the present design is that it is closer to that built in the 1960s (which had a large central island) than the one built after that which was essentially a mini roundabout surrounded by two lanes of traffic. A striking difference, however, is that the 1960s island was grassed whereas the 21st century one is paved!
So you’ve decided that going away isn’t worth the pfaff and anyway you live in the best place in the country and the weather’s perf… OK, scrub that last bit. The weather’s variable. Today, it’s lovely. Tomorrow…
So what to do? Well, head down to the beach – that bit just to the east of the pier next to the Volks Railway Aquarium Station, The Warren On The Beach is doing another few weeks of theatre, cabaret, comedy and family shows, alongside an outdoor stage, street food and bars till August 30.
The indoor-outdoor site is free to enter, which means it’s there for a quick drink, and there’s a Happy Hour, where you get 20% off all drinks, Monday to Thursday before 6pm.
Shitfaced Shakespeare (23 – 30 August) will be treading the boards on the beach once again with Much Ado About Nothing. Featuring the finest classically-trained professional performers and one fully Shitfaced cast member, we guarantee that no two nights are ever the same. Having toured the world, broken America and sold-out the West End, they’re back on Brighton beach for one week only.
Lost in Translation Circus Present: Cabaret Paradiso (12 – 22 August) a phenomenal show for all the family featuring cabaret, burlesque, circus, sideshow and contemporary variety. Created in a moment where the world of arts stood still, Cabaret Paradiso celebrates performers from different arts forms and backgrounds, bringing back all the joy, celebration, hilarity, cheekiness, and irreverence that is a great night out. Indulge in fabulous fun for everyone in Brighton’s quirkiest new venue down on the beachfront and featuring Circus Abyssinia stars Bibi and Bichu.
The Snail and the Whale (13 – 30 August) continue their national tour with a string of sea-side shows. The Olivier award-winning cast bring Julia Donaldson’s much-loved picture-book to life.
For full line up and tickets head to warrenonthebeach.co.uk
One of the things we’ve missed most this past year has been going out and seeing people do extraordinary things, things that we couldn’t imagine doing ourselves. Whether that’s playing an instrument, performing some act of athletic wonder or somesuch. If what you’ve most missed has been virtuoso acrobatics – vaulting somersaults, breath-taking trapeze and daredevil balances on the highwire, well, are you in luck.
Passagers is “an intoxicating mix of dance, physical theatre, acrobatics, circus skills and original music” performed by Canadian troupe The 7 Fingers that sounds just extraordinary.
Trapeze is a fantastic motif for our times – taking a leap off into the air, a leap from holding on to something into space and on to something new. “Passagers was originally designed as an ode to travel – departure versus arrival, chance versus choice, familiar versus foreign, confinement versus border-crossing” says 7 Fingers co-founder Shana Carroll. “Those themes have taken on a new meaning for all of us recently, with the very idea of departing or arriving feeling like a distant dream.” Themes that, in our strange new world, have taken on very new and very real meanings.
It’s on at The Dome on 30 September and 1 October.
Tickets range from £10 (restricted view) to £23.50. Family tickets and concessions available.
If you prefer your wine to be powerful rather than elegant, you’re in luck. Andrew Polmear tells all
What’s the next big discovery among European wines? People talk about Hungary and Croatia, but my money is on Portugal. It’s a country that’s always made wines for its own consumption but, under the dead hand of President Salazar, there wasn’t much incentive to make quality wines. The British shippers had been buying wine from the Douro valley in the north east of Portugal since the late 17th century. They added brandy to the wine to preserve it during shipping and so port was born. But less and less port is drunk now in Britain and the growers are turning back to unfortified wine, but using modern wine-making methods. The result is a revelation.
I’ve been drinking two Portuguese reds: ‘Animus’ from the Douro made by Vicente Faria Vinhos, selling at Aldi for the extraordinary price of £5.49; and The Society’s Portuguese Red from the Setubal Peninsula, made by Casa Ermelinda Freitas, and sold at £6.50 by The Wine Society. They are both 2019 but they come from very different ‘terroirs’.
The Douro is high altitude, sharply drained, stony and mountainous, while the Setubal peninsular is low lying, with sandy soil, exposed to cooling ocean breezes. Both areas get hot. But despite the different ‘terroirs’ both are instantly recognisable as Portuguese. It’s the huge mouth-feel they have – what the wine trade calls ‘structure’. It’s the opposite of watery – a feeling of wine in the mouth that is so satisfying that flavour comes a mere second. It’s like velvet on the tongue. But there is flavour: black plums and dark cherries with a hint of perfume. Is that Turkish delight? Is it woodsmoke?
How do they do it? Conditions are right: plenty of sun, but enough cloud and cool ocean breezes to avoid the wine tasting like jam. Then they have marvellous local grapes. The star is Touriga National, a powerful grape with dark rich fruit and a leathery taste reminiscent of Cabernet Sauvignon. And there’s Tinta Roriz (which the Spanish call Tempranillo) – another big-flavoured grape. The wine from Setubal is from the Castelao grape plus a little Alicante Bouschet, a rich combination.
Then there’s the wine-making. EU funding in the 1990s enabled a lot of wine-makers to move to temperature-controlled, stainless steel vats. At the same time, higher educational institutes in Lisbon and Vila Real taught modern methods to a whole generation of wine-makers.
Now family wine-makers are producing their own wine, like the Freitas family, or, like Vicente Faria, are branching out so they can bottle enough wine to interest supermarkets like Aldi. They must soon rumble the fact that wine lovers are prepared to pay more for wine this good and prices will go up.
If you prefer wines that are elegant rather than powerful, if you like Burgundy with its Pinot Noir, rather than Bordeaux with its Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot, then Portuguese reds are not for you. But if you share my love of power, my enjoyment of wine that lets you know you’ve got a real mouthful, then Portuguese reds do the job wonderfully.
We’re all about getting the best out of a good old British summer as we keep calm and holiday at home. And what’s a #staycation without a spot of lunch and some English heritage thrown in? Gilly Smith finds out
Just an hour and a half out of Brighton in Chatham is a bit of a treasure, a family-owned English distillery making not just a rather lovely whisky out of local barley, wheat and rye, but vodkas and gins too. A tour of the distillery, complete with tastings, followed by lunch overlooking the River Medway is a lovely reminder of the skill, craftsmanship and history to be found on our doorstep.
Copper Rivet Distillery, perched on the dry dock at Chatham’s Royal Dockyards is a Victorian Grade II listed pump, until recently a relic from the industrial revolution, watching this corner of Kent follow its demise.
It took the vision (and family cash) of Matthew Russell who was picnicking one day at Upnor Castle on the other side of the Medway to reinvent it and build it into an icon of 21st century innovation. His father, Bob, had built up the coffers over 30 years in the gift box drinks industry, and together, they built the family company. Four years on and recruiting only from British universities, the Russells have put together a team led by Abhishek “Abhi” Banik from Heriot-Watt University, Copper Rivet has become the only spirit maker in Kent, and one of just a few in the UK to create them all the way from grain to glass.
Its Dockyard spirits include a sweet pink gin made with Kent strawberries. The vodkas are so packed with flavour that you could drink them neat on the rocks and dream of Russia. And the whiskies, initially a by-product of the gin and vodka are already raising eyebrows among the cognoscenti.
After the tour and tasting, lunch overlooking the river is a local, seasonal treat with two courses for £23 and three for £28. Try the scallop, treacle cured trout, sesame and Sussex tomato ponzu to start followed by saddle of lamb, aubergine caviar, kale chimichurri, goats curd, lamb scrumpet and Jersey Royals. And of course, all those strawberries macerating in gin are repurposed by chef, Will Freeman for dessert, a choux bun and rice pudding patisserie.
For more information, https://www.copperrivetdistillery.com
Harry Hillery talks about his Brighton AIDS Memorial project and the need to keep the light shining
In Brighton on World AIDS Day, many of us huddle together at the vigil in New Steine Gardens to “hear the voices of dead friends.”
Two hundred souls claimed by the virus are remembered as their names are read, one after another. When I hear my friend Andrea’s name, memories flicker like the candle cradled in my hand, but what settles in my mind is the smile of the bright-eyed Brazilian florist who made me laugh every day. For me, it’s important that my thoughts linger on his life and exuberance, however short, before the disease choked the life from his lungs on an AIDS ward. I remember many of the people whose names are read at the vigil, but there are fewer faces I recognise in the crowd each passing year.
Brighton has always been a transient place, an oasis many use to find their queer identity before moving on. Sometimes I worry I might be the only person left in the crowd of candles who remembers Andrea (pictured in 1989), and it saddens me to think all that might eventually remain of him and the other souls, are names forever bound to a virus and death.
In 1989 I trained as a volunteer at the Sussex AIDS Centre and Helpline to help, but also to learn about the disease and stay alive. The Brighton area was hit hard by AIDS and due to the age and number of victims, many likened the experience to being in a war. When I opened the Evening Argus and read the hate or walked up St. James’s Street and saw GAY – GOT AIDS YET sprayed on a wall, it definitely felt like we were under attack and losing. But as writer and activist Neil Bartlett once reminded me, using war as a metaphor for AIDS is dangerous because it suggests an end. World War One stopped at 11 o’clock on the 11 November 1918 with an armistice, but HIV, AIDS and the stigma that surrounds it continues still. So many died, but so little remains to tell the story, just ghosts, shadows and a few buildings turned into more luxury flats.
I created the Brighton AIDS Memorial collection to record stories, capture memories and trap the light before it disappears. Any remembrance must acknowledge the horror and the pain, but must also celebrate those we lost and provide a cathartic release. My journey has unearthed so much already, but I know there’s so much more that needs to be curated, archived and made accessible for future generations. My aim has always been to create a safe home for remembrance, recognise the queer heroes, trailblazers and organisations, and bring together all the photos, writing and ephemera in one place.
So please take a look in those shoe boxes under the bed, open the scrapbooks and photo albums and help me build the collection. Or if you have a story to tell or someone to remember please get in touch and let the light back in.
brightonaidsmemorial@gmail.com
The Brighton AIDS Memorial collection can be found on Instagram (thebrightonaidsmemorial) and
www.queerheritagesouth.co.uk
News and views from West Hill and Seven Dials in Brighton
