In Context—Direct Brush Sketch and A Brief Review of “Taboo.”

I know last week when I started the new series “In-Context” I wrote that I wouldn’t be writing a blog post with the images—but today’s entry really required a bit more “context.”

In January I started watching “Taboo” staring Tom Hardy. Readers of my blog already know I’m a huge Tom Hardy fan and think he should have received an Academy Award for “Legend,” a Kray Brothers bio-pic in which he plays both brothers.

It will come as no surprise that I started watching “Taboo” when it aired in January. However I got ill and needed all my spare time for work, and then of course life interrupted with new obstacles. It sat on the DVR until this past week when I resumed watching at episode 3.

The show is set around the war of 1812. Hardy plays James Delaney, a British subject who has something (a trading post near Vancouver) that everyone wants—the Americans, The East India Company, the English Crown, a woman claiming to be the widow of Delaney’s deceased and estranged father…).

The show isn’t for everyone. It contains graphic violence and deals with incest. But it has a fantastically plotted script and a great cast of actors. And the cinematography is beautifully decrepit—i.e., dirty, grimy London in the early 1800s. Of course there are interesting hats and hair styles and great coats taking yardage of fabric, little heed of germ theory (because of all the muck), and it’s all really quite wonderful.

So while posting this piece in the “In-Context” category I just had to give you a little bit of a review. I’m sure you can find this show on pay-per-view or some streaming service.

I will have an updated review of the Handbook Watercolor Journal in a later post in a few weeks. I’m still working through the book and getting used to the paper’s idiosyncratic behaviors.

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