Naked Splendour

C Central, Carlton Hotel
5-30 August 2010, 15:10

Philip Herbert is a late middle-aged man, bald and obese, with pierced “moobs” and a ponderous belly hanging low enough to hide his genitals. He’s no oil painting – oh, except he is.

For the past 30 years, in addition to his work as an actor (best known as Julian Clary’s long suffering straight man), Herbert has earned his crust as a life model, stripping off for art classes to draw and paint him. In this one-man show, he relates some of his modelling thoughts and experiences (“there’s so much flesh, I don’t think I can fit it all on one page,” worried one student, as if Herbert couldn’t hear him).

Theatregoers are given drawing boards and invited to draw him too as he performs. The sounds of pencils and rubbers scratching and erasing at the paper as Herbert strikes a quiet pose adds to the meditative quality of this surprisingly enjoyable and uplifting show.