My closest friend Laura lives in London, I live 300+ miles away in Edinburgh. But I’ve ended up down here for some personal reasons and it happened to also be her birthday. So I headed into Zone 1 to meet up with her, look at some art together and drink exactly two half pints. The venue we selected, The National Gallery. The art in our sights, its permanent collection. An enormous, expensive and rounded assortment, featuring everyone from unknown artist to Leonardo da Vinci.

There are delays, I arrive late on a slightly different tube line than planned or intended, when I emerge from the underground she’s waiting with a smile and we go straight to the gallery. After dipping my hand in one of the fountains we head straight inside, up a bunch of steps and into a building stacked past the rafters with art. We pick up no maps and follow no floorpan, we go with our heart, wherever the art drags us.

Room 42 is but a broom cupboard compared to the expansive spaces of the main galleries. In it, is a collection of European landscape paintings from the 19th century. They are arrayed across two walls, around thirty in total, grouped in no particular way with not much more than the artists names as explanation. Nestled to one side, the one that caught my eye, was The Sky at Sunrise, French, artist unknown. An inscription along the bottom edge says (in French) ‘4th of May 1821 at half past five’. A wisp of land hugs its bottom edge, but the sky is the painting. It’s a sky that reminds me of early mornings making timelapse videos and watching the light change, the clouds roll. The framing, the massive sky making mole hills out of the landscape below. It speaks to what feels important, at this time in the morning, this moment of first sunlight. There are an uncountable number of great artists celebrated here, enough Rembrandt’s to build an impressive funeral pyre. But unknown artist, for this moment, they had my heart and my attention. It isn’t the best painting in the gallery, it’s not even the best painting on this wall. But feeling a connection to it, having had a similar moment, where the cold and the early hour feels worth it. That felt important.

The National Gallery is a building of sightlines, every corner hides, then reveals a painting on a distant wall. Inviting you to break sequence, to embrace an artworks siren call, to go straight to it, only to be distracted by a dozen other things along the way. The Adoration of the Shepards, by Guido Reni, is one of these sirens, it fills an entire wall, stopping barely an inch below the moulding. It’s highlights glow, it’s darkness murks, it feels like a true work of Christian worship an indelible mandala. People vie to use the sightline as a backdrop, aligning themselves in the middle of arches and doorways to make very instagramable pictures. Creating juxtaposed tableaus with the 400 year old altarpiece, gallery itself and themselves or their traveling companions. Layers of history and meaning, displaced, but still revered.

These photographers, instagram lifestyle bloggers and wannabes, crowd two particular paintings. Monets Water Lilies and van Goghs Sunflowers. The first is enormous, taking up much of wall, the latter is just painting sized. But both are, as much as flat object can be, at capacity. There are always people there, having their picture taken, taking pictures of the them or my own case, taking pictures of people taking pictures of them. What caused this cultural phenomena is up for grabs. Both are paintings by household name artists, both are part of a series, there are half a dozen Sunflowers and over 250 Water Lilies. They are copied and remade by their artists, perhaps seeking deeper meaning or some kind of perfection. Since then, they’ve been copied and photographed endlessly, there are 10 sunflowers made a second, 250 copies of the water lilies produced a minute. They are works that, because of their over reproduction, are impossible to actually see. Looking at them you see book covers and Simpsons episodes, Laura jokes she recognises the Sunflowers from the background of a photogenic friends selfies. These paintings are good, but there’s no denying that they are overrated. Besides, the best thing in the gallery is surely personal preference. But social media has a thought free answer, you can snap pictures with both in less than 5 minutes, collecting the memories and clout like pocket monsters in Pokémon Go. I don’t know how much I care, there’s no right or wrong way to enjoy art. But it feels weird, there’s so much space elsewhere, so many works waiting for adoration and attention, ones that don’t have a queue.

In Room 23 we find two things, portraits of the Dutch and Dutch still lives. The still lives are arrangements of lobster, fine dinnerware and overfilled bowls of fruit, there is also the odd skull. They are painted in the moment before these items topple from their precarious perches, gooseberries hang on for dear life, plates are about to clatter to the ground. But, compared to the portraits, these objects seem frozen, solid, immobile. The people are slightly soft in comparison, out of focus, captured on the move. Their skin glowing in the light. One of them is holding a skull, perhaps a symbol of impermanence, or a warning. In the adjoining Room 24 I see Jupiter and Antiope, a painting by Hendrik Goltzius. It depicts the god Jupiter, in disguise, seducing Antiope. It’s a scene I most recently saw play out in Clash of the Titans 3D. Wikipedia describes it as a ‘frequent theme in western painting’ perhaps ‘western art’ is more accurate.

Something across the room catches Laura’s eye, she walks over to it, mine wonder closer. There I see Ecco Homo, a painted sketch by Rembrandt, it is a study for one of his etchings, not intended for sale or public consumption. It is of Christ, as much is in the National Gallery, during his trial by Pontius Pilate. It is fascinating to me what draws Rembrandt’s eye, where he lavishes detail. In the foreground of the work, the age on Pilate’s face, the glints on his buttons, the drapery and pattern in his robes, all of it is picked out. The shine on a Roman soldier’s helmet, a near cartoonish expression on his face. Christ himself is but a sketch in comparison. A few blocks of colour, a little more time spent on the crown, Rembrandt knows him too well, he need not sketch detail he can add so easily. Away from the foreground the detail fades away, faces in the crowd go out of focus. They become a mass of beachball shapes, merely an impression. First and foremost, Rembrandt lavishes the detail where the light falls. It’s just less obvious in his finished work. The term ‘Rembrandt lighting’ persists in film, TV and photography to this day, it characterises a specific technique, it gives hard shadows, dramatic tension.

“There’s two Michelangelo’s on that side and a Leonardo on the other.”

Says a guard who overhears us looking for Michelangelo and deriding the comparatively younger art. He is right of corse, this is Room 9, we go right first and Michelangelo jump scares us with two beautiful, unfinished paintings.

The Manchester Madonna captures me here (above, left), it’s sat for 500 years, never returned to, the artist left it mid thought, partway though his brushstroke. Penciled in drapery on the left, started, buy uncoloured in the middle and totally finished by the right side. It feels so impossible and etherial, a captured moment. You can defocus your eyes and, just about, see the painting finished, fill the details, there are most of the trees that would make the forest. I love that, I love being forced to engage and suppose. Seeing the method is also very interesting. The workings behind the magic trick are hard work, the application of time and immense talent.

A few smaller spaces away, is stored a very precious artefact. Room 17a has Iow lighting, grey walls and a single occupant, The Burlington House Cartoon. A meter wide by 1.5 high, chalk and charcoal on aged paper. A da Vinci. It’s a study for an unfinished or perhaps never started work, the largest surviving drawing of his. Two women, Mary and her mother, another saint, watch over a babyish Jesus while he plays with St. John the Baptist. A common enough arrangement for the art in this gallery, familiar subjects, yet more catholic adoration. I relate to Laura what I have heard about the Mona Lisa, that you can’t tell where the edge of her mouth is. Da Vinci’s work is so soft, fuzzy, details roll into one another. This is the only room with one picture in it, the dedication, dimmed lights, extra effort. It makes conversations more hushed, whispers more reverent. The drawing feels so much more special because of it, like you’re viewing something you shouldn’t be. We spent a while there, marvelling quietly.

We were fill entirely on art, our batteries charged, our attention depleted. On the way out of the gallery, when we U turn and go look at two Picassos, they’re 90° from The Sunflowers, so we’d missed them before. The crowds drew more attention. Laura likes the more realist one, she likes the mothers overly long fingers cradling her child. I prefer, if not by much, the cubist one. There is sand mixed into the blacks, there are fractions and glances of the objects it depicts. Like the still lives from earlier, that are nearly falling off mantel pieces, there is a leap of faith, explanation and decoding necessary, just like, a lot more of it.

Finally out of the gallery Laura takes me to Soho, because it’s nearby and it’s where the gays are, so I will fit in. Also and perhaps mostly, she wants to go to a sloppy fast food vegan burger place. The burger is great, it’s accompanied by mountains of fries and wonderful conversation about art and instagrammers. After we go for half pints at The French House, as apparently everything is in half pints there. The beer is cool and the conversation continues and wonders, we overhear the people next to us talking about the ‘Actors and Producers strike’. We will roll eyes about this later, the producers being the reason for actors and writers being on strike. Laura is particularly affected, working behind the camera in the industry, her partner and flatmate too, she has skin in this game and is annoyed at the implication. Who would a producer strike at?

We wonder around a bit after the pub and I spot Big Ben in the distance, so we head towards it, in search of tourism. Along the way we are waylaid by Buckingham Place, I’d never seen it in person and Laura remembered going in her school years, so it seemed appropriate. Two more of Londons sightlines, these ones much more difficult to arrange, manage. But equally stunning as those in the National Gallery. The buildings look slightly fake in the distance, like paintings or replicas. They are obsessively well manicured and kept, true landmarks. St James’s Park is our route to the Palace, Laura buys me an overpriced coffee and explains that the deckchairs here cost £3 per hour to use. This immediacy becomes a personal injustice, I suddenly want to sit on one out of spite and anger. Concessions, or rather conecessions, it is spelled both ways on the sign, knock it down to £3.50 per hour. Disability and being an OAP are particularly called out, reminding you there are accommodations, but no free rides in the UK. Quite how this came to pass, why the King needs £3 per hour per chair I do not know. He’s a man with at least two golden carriages and can’t offer a free seat to other over 70’s.

When we get there, Buckingham Place reminds me of a tower block, all windows, flat fronted, it has all the character of a soviet administration building. I get more entertainment out of Big Ben, mainly by saying it’s a common misconception, but the tower is called Big Ben and the bell Elisabeth. Laura refuses to laugh and tells me sternly, in a tone I remember too well, “I heard you the first time,” when I re-explain the joke. I smile, It reminds me of when she lived nearer and we spent more time together. I relay the joke on WhatsApp and get a better response out of my girlfriend.

On our return to Soho, we see the picture perfect ad executive, or at least the guy I’d cast as an ad executive in an advert. He is bald, in his mid-to-late-forties, somewhat round and talking into a mobile phone, there is a problem with the fonts, the graphic designer just needs to fix it. Laura fills me in, as work lets out the demographic of Soho changes, less hot gay twenty-somethings, more mid-to-late-forties ad executives. But she says it in less words and with more eloquence.

We turn a corner past an advert/display for the feast day of Mary Magdalene at a local church. There is a laminated print out of some wonderful Catholic art, an A4 reverie of the halls of the stuff we’d been walking though a few hours back. Past the church and back in the streets of Soho, I see she is right. The switchover is at hand, the day shift is heading out, the evening crew have arrived. Everyone got older and male’er while we were wondering around St James’s Park, I should have done a timelapse.

There is another half pint each waiting at The French House, the women behind the bar recognises us and asks where we’ve been. We sheepishly admit I’m from out of town and I’ve been on the tourist trails. Theses drinks and this conversation is equally wonderful as the last.

The return journey to the place I’m staying, an hour outside the city, was punctuated by a trip (on foot) though Paddington station. It’s an enormous Victorian hall that looks like every other station in the UK and whatever variety of rush hour I’d elected to travel at, it was fucking packed. This is where I saw Managing Director he/him, I’m 40% sure he was talking to another Managing Director he/him and 80% sure that they (hes) were both employees of National Rail. Stopped for meeting that could be an email in this Victorian palace of mass transport. There’s a lot been said about pronoun pins and LGBT+ flags or colours bedecking logos, if pridewashing can atone for a lack of, or lacking policy. It’s 20+ days past the end of June and London, especially Soho is still draped in pride flags. They do make me feel more accepted and welcomed. Enforced pronouns in the bio for Managing Directors can only be interpreted as a win. At least in part because if he didn’t agree, if he wanted to make a fuss, he could manage and direct the pronouns away, leave his badge empty, his trains de-rainbowed.

I step off the bus, the last leg of my journey back and stop at the petrol station, it is the closest shop. There are cut flowers for sale, squished roses, wilting tulips, sunflowers. Here in part because of the painting I saw today, the one being photographed, selfied next too and adored. They will never be famous sunflowers, but to the right person, they might just mean the world.