Ravenna

The Severn Forum runs a programme of lectures on theological subjects, so tonight's "The mosaics of Ravenna" may have seemed a bit of a let off. It turned out to be nothing of the sort. Christopher Herbert, now the retired Bishop of St Albans, had the good fortune to visit Ravenna when his diocese was twinned with dioceses local to that city. Making full use of his red carpet reception, he has now put together a splendid talk, explaining what caused Ravenna to become the focus of so many "glittering prizes", and how they illustrate the development of doctrine in the early church.

So, through a sequence of excellent slides, we came to consider the absence of representations of Christ crucified; to observe that Jesus - shown naked in the Jordan in the late 5th Century - was not baptized by total immersion; and why the Good Shepherd was portrayed wearing a toga.

My photograph shows Dr. Herbert in front of a photograph of the figure of Archbishop Maximiamus - "drawn" in mosaic more than 1,500 years ago, he could be at home amongst our National Portrait Gallery's Contemporary Displays.

And the lecturer is clearly himself at home in the world of art - not just church/biblical - history: parallels with David Hockney's swimming pool pictures and an Anish Kapoor sculpture round out his talk, though he wears his learning lightly.

Great stuff, and deserving of a larger audience than the 50 or so who turned out. Surely it wasn't the football? I didn't even notice that it was being sacrificed: anyway, the talk ended early enough to let me watch the final 20 minutes - a satisfactory result!

On Sunday evening, we were in the (virtual) presence of another master of his art, Woody Allen - his Blue Jasmine, brilliantly over ripe, and redolent of the world of F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Showtime

Being in London for two nights gave us plenty of time to see exhibitions (on Friday). First, we went to Cork Street, to look at the amazing "hyperphotos" by Jean-François Rauzier. The best of these were landscapes with a difference - a seamless stitching together of many images of extreme detail to form a large-scale composition. I was less convinced by the stage-set interiors, especially those with women lying (dead, one supposed) in the foreground. Not my sort of photography, but worth a visit.

On to a packed Royal Academy, the courtyard of which at present sees Reynolds confronting a massive array of silver profiteroles, the work of Anish Kapoor. What a delightful contrast to the drear Anthony Caro sculpture, dominating that space on my last visit!

I didn't in fact get to the big Kapoor show inside, which Caroline much enjoyed. Instead, I lingered over the three sculptors on display in the Sackler Wing, Gill, Epstein and the hard-to-pronounce Gaudier-Brzeska. Of the three, I particularly admired Gaudier-Brzeska's work. Though his life was the shortest, his work seemed the most radical.

From "Wild Thing" I moved on to "Hard Rain" on the railings at St Martin's-in-the-Fields. This is an extremely striking and accessible series of photographs to illustrate the words of the Dylan song, and accompany the build-up to Copenhagen. Well done St Martin's, which, in its much-transformed state, as I felt on a previous visit is fast becoming a centre of vision for this most central point in the West End.

Finally, to the National Gallery for "The Sacred Made Real". I had been urged to visit this show by a number of different people, and wish I'd left more time for it: though it's not a large exhibition, the work is of great intensity, beautifully curated and lit. Such a contrast between Gill's attenuated stone Christ Crucified at the Academy in the morning, and the painted wooden images here!

As always for me, the pieces by Velázquez seemed to shine out, and in particular Mother Geronimo. What a master!