On the second day of working in the New Hall Art Collection, I was sent to Kettle’s Yard to deliver a package. Kettle’s Yard was the former home of Jim Ede, an art collector and friend of artists, who wove art into his home. And art to him wasn’t confined to the conventional definitions of painting, sculpture, print, drawing etc., but included things like pebbles, shells and selected drawings of his daughters. After delivering the package, I was brought round the house before it opened for the day’s viewings.
I’d been into the house before, and I remember thinking how peaceful it would be, to one day come back in the morning when people were at school or work, and pick up a book, sit in one of his armchairs surrounded by Arthur Wallis ship paintings, and just read. Being there so early that day meant it was largely empty aside from the two Andrews who were setting it up, the curator, and me, and so it felt less like a house for viewing and more like a house for living. The beauty of the house is that it feels private (even when filled with people looking at it) and like it’s breathing, particularly with its airy light colour scheme and minimalist furniture.
On one off the tables, there is a spiral of pebbles. Each was close to spherical, but not quite, just as the spiral is comprised of almost circles. In an essay (unpublished, but a photocopy of it in his handwriting can be found in the house), Ede mused about pebbles and perfection. To find the perfect pebble, he writes, is a once in a century, a once in a continent matter. He then asks: if perfection is so rarely found in nature why do we expect – demand- perfection in art? Why must art be first-rate, or ‘the best and the brightest’ as Matthew Arnold once put it. The detail and particular beauty in the imperfections of nature are miracles, in Ede’s eyes, and no less worthy of being seen as art than the most perfect Michaelangelo. (Although, of course, even Michaelangelo’s David is literally riddled with imperfection.)
Later that evening, I cycled down to the Riverbank Club. As I walked through the leafy footpath to ‘Heaven’s Door’, the first drops of light rain began to fall after a scorching weekend. Not the perfect weather for a swim, but I was there, and the river was inviting. A few people were under a tent, sheltering from the rain, and seeing me pick up my towel they realized I was going for a swim.
‘Can’t swim with your clothes on love!’ One lady joked, and, suddenly conscious of how fully clothed I was in front of their nakedness (the riverbank club is costumes optional) I sort of stammered a ‘Oh, I’m just going to change over there,’ and scurried away to the changing hut.
It is dim and slightly musty in there, and on the wall there are newspaper articles, quotes and a board detailing kingfisher sightings hung up. One of the pieces of paper reads ‘It is entirely good and full of grace to be here’, which I feel describes the riverbank club well – a place where all are welcome, all are worthy, nothing is required of you except to savour the moment. It is (and has been for me) a sort of Eden in Cambridge, a place where I feel good and, particularly in the water, full of grace.
But as I got out of my clothes I wondered, what had made me so bashful in front of those lovely, naked people? Part of me felt rude just being clothed before them, and yet part of me was terrified of the act of unclothing before them. I’ve often looked at the bodies of the people there, sun blushed and bearing the kind marks of age that makes the body so interesting, and felt embarrassed at my young body, smooth and exposed. Like a pebble that has no beautiful imperfections, just a plane of skin. How silly, I thought, when society elevates that sort of beauty, the untrialled and uncut. And yet when I’m wearing clothes in society, bearing a body close to conventional standards of ‘beauty’, I don’t feel confident in it either.
I slipped into the river, and swam towards Grantchester, feeling the cool water on my skin and the occasional river weed across my belly. Breathe, breathe, breathe. Arms, legs, dunk-head-in. Gradually my body became in my mind not an appraisable object but was seal-like, moving me through the water. No wondering if my appearance was worthy of being an art object, if my perfections and imperfections affected my worth. Just a miracle, a girl-seal, swimming naked at 8pm in the drizzle, fearfully and wonderfully made.
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