Knees up Mother Brown!

A bit of very lively and professional street theatre. A musical on the move in the square by Tate Britain. It was drawing an enthusiastic audience, but unfortunately we couldn't stay long as it was very, very hot and also we had a timed ticket for an exhibition across the road.

We are spending a few days in London and travelled down by train this morning. This afternoon we went to the Lowry exhibition at Tate Britain and excellent it was too.

I thought I knew Lowry, after all I've seen his pictures several times at the Lowry in Salford. But this was different. The exhibition draws together a huge collection of his work and shows different aspects, such as how he was influenced by the French Impressionists. We all know Lowry for his 'matchstick' people, but this exhibition shows how he was actually a landscape painter and, as he was painting industrial landscapes, he had to put people in them.

What was most impressive were the five huge city panoramas he painted in the 1950s, together with three views of Welsh mining towns painted a little later. The first time these have all been shown together. Here he was painting imaginary landscapes of ailing postwar cities; the awful impact of industry on the environment. But non-judgemental and certainly not sentimental.

I think a lot of people were sitting pondering these paintings and maybe wondering how well we have moved on from this since. Have we dealt with the collapse of industry and built a better future for everyone? We certainly seem to be going backwards at the moment. In 1928 Lowry painted a picture of a family being evicted from their home. If he was still around today, he might have found he could do this again.