Alan Sorrell: reconstructing the past

The Sir John Soane’s Museum in London has been hosting an exhibition Alan Sorrell – A Life Reconstructed (ed. Sacha Llewellyn and Richard Sorrell; Sansom & Company, 2013). The excellent illustrated catalogue contains a number of essays:

• Richard Sorrell: Introduction: a portrait of my father
• Peyton Skipwith, The Royal College of Art & the 1930s: developing a sense of design and form
• Sacha Llewellyn, The British School at Rome 1928-1930: ‘The stirring up process’
• Brian Foss: Alan Sorrell’s war, 1939-46: a view from above
• Alan Powers, Murals and public paintings: ‘community service’
• Sara Perry and Matthew Johnson, Alan Sorrell as reconstruction artist: making ‘dry bones live’
• Richard Sorrell, Travels and direct-observational painting
• Ian Sanders, Chronology

There are some unexpected images: Sudanese Express Passing Abu Simbel (1961), Construction of a Runway at an Aerodrome (1946), Istanbul: the wall of Manuel Comnenus (1954). The final section showing covers from his volumes of reconstructions reminds us of the legacy of Sorrell.

Archaeology at Athens International Airport

Athens International Airport Museum Guide

The construction of the Athens International Airport ‘Eleftherios Venizelos’ revealed a number of archaeological remains. The terminal building houses a small museum containing finds from the Neolithic to the post-Byzantine period. There is a short bilingual guide to the museum (Mesogeia Attica History & Civilisation) with a plan, a map of sites from the airport zone, photographs of some sites, and descriptions of a selection of the finds. The sections include:

• Excavations on the site of the Airport at Spata
• Archaeological evidence from late antiquity to the Post-Byzantine period in the area of the Airport
• The excavations at Saints Peter and Paul church area, Spata