It's really easy to forget how uncool the cool people in a city are: It's the opening few days of the Glasgow International festival, so Tinka and I ventured out to see a couple of exhibits. Patti Smith's artwork is a lot more delicate than I think we were expecting it to be, although her reaction to 9/11 was, if I can be a little uncharitable (after all, how do you react to something like that?), a trifle limited and unadventurous. It makes you wonder - how much has to do with a person's fame outside of art when they move into that sphere? Would anyone have given her drawings and compostitions the time of day if she hadn't been the mildly terrifying grande dame of the US folk indie that she so clearly is?

Ross Sinclair's work was a bit repetitive too, unfortunately - huge blocks of colour and lettering showing the same one idea over and over, with only the slightest difference between each canvass. Yes, it made the subtle differences in placement etc... more important, but that didn't make the work particularly illuminating or visually stimulating.

The crowd at the CCA there for the free whisky art were far more entertaining to watch - especially the girl who was trying so damn hard to be noticed: turned-up jeans with black socks, turquoise high heels and an utterly ridiculous "look at me!!!!" floppy-brimmed straw hat. Some people should just be taken to one side and asked "now, do you want to be noticed, or do you want to be remembered fondly?"

Dave xx

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