Best Behavior

Some cool maltese dog behavior images:

Best Behavior


Image by Shavar Ross
A cute Maltese/Lhaso Apso mix poses for her master through the corner of her eye.

Fournier Street – a Hawksmoor tour 11


Image by O.F.E.
When Gilbert and George moved into Fournier Street, it was because the monthly rent was £16, and the landlords didn’t mind whether you slept in the building or used it as a studio. The area was run-down, but, says Gilbert, "totally magic, romantic".

Fournier Street was occupied by buttonmakers, furriers and hat-makers, and the area was Jewish. "The front doors were open all day," says George. "All the windows were open, so people would speak to each other from one side of the street to the other. Extraordinary antique behaviour.

"This area has been everything. It’s been a Roman cemetery, it’s been part of the hospital for the returning Crusaders. It’s been a manufacturing base for guns which, curiously, was staffed entirely by Germans.

"In between the Jews and the Bangladeshis, it was briefly Maltese, then Somali. It was extraordinary when it was Maltese because they all had Alsatian dogs, they kept ferrets, they played cards all day."

Their London centres around Fournier Street, which is now seen as a masterpiece of early Georgian architecture, just as Gilbert and George are hailed as pioneers of the East End art scene. "George used to teach in Hoxton in 1967," says Gilbert. "In the evening, when we came back, my God."

"All the businesses were totally shuttered," says George. "Totally deserted – scary. You could either have sex with a stranger or get beaten up. Those were the only two choices. And that was only Hoxton Square!"

"It’s extraordinary to think that within walking distance you can find the tomb of John Wesley, the founder of Methodism – the tomb of George Fox, the founder of the Quakers, of Daniel Defoe, author of one of the few books in the world which is never out of print, John Bunyan, and William Blake," says George. "Only one grave has a jam-jar of flowers – William Blake".

"We rather like John Bunyan," says Gilbert, "because we feel that’s what we did – Pilgrim’s Progress. Every year we have to fight all the moral dilemmas in ourselves."

To explore this further, Gilbert and George take me on a tour. The first stop is the mosque on the corner of Fournier Street and Brick Lane. "That was the synagogue when we were students," says George. "The posh synagogue at that."

"It was a French church," says Gilbert. "A Huguenot church. They tried to convert Jewish people to Christianity. It didn’t work."

Alastair McKay, Evening Standard

31 Jan 2007

www.thisislondon.co.uk/arts/article-23383740-gilbert-and-…

Best Behavior