Guardian Prize 26,872 by Paul

I always find Paul puzzles a pleasure to solve and blog.  Thank you Paul.

There is an artist sculptors theme here though it didn’t feel like it was the main event, more of a side show.

completed grid
Across
1 CABARET Queen possibly grasping simple form of entertainment (7)
CAT (queen possibly, a female) containing BARE (simple)
5 DOODLES Drawings, quite a few on back of card (7)
OODLES (quite a few) following (on) carD (back of)
9 KOONS Gesture of defiance contrary for artist (5)
SNOOK (gesture of defiance) reversed (contrary) – Jeff Koons
10 TENNIS PRO Prison reforms attributed to figure in racketeer? (6,3)
PRISON* anagram=reforms follows (attached to) TEN (a figure, number)
11 NOTABILITY A word of gratitude in the peerage for eminence (10)
TA (word if gratitude) in NOBILITY (the peerage)
12 HOD Builder’s trough — oops, it’s fallen over! (3)
D’OH (oops) reversed (fallen over)
14 SCHOOLMASTER Fish joining stream after swimming instructor (12)
SCHOOL (fish) with STREAM* anagram= swimming
18 EAU DE COLOGNE Each clue needs one dog trained to find the scent (3,2,7)
EA (each) with anagram (trained) of CLUE with ONE DOG
21 WIT Card and cut (3)
WITh (and, cut)
22 CROSSROADS Meeting of Ford and British colonialist reported as a turning point (10)
CROSS (ford, cross a river) and ROADS sounds like (reported) Rhodes (British colonialist)
25 ROCK OPERA Time when You’ll Never Walk Alone was sung by legendary giant in musical show (4,5)
ROC KOP ERA – the Roc is a legendary giant bird, You’ll Never Walk Alone is sung by the KOP (supporters of Liverpool Football Club) and the ERA is the time it would have been singing it.  Clear as Mudd.

Update: thanks to Tony for pointing out that a rock opera is “a work in rock” which is what sculptors traditionally do.  This passed me by completely.

26 MOORE Dock strike’s ending for artist (5)
MOOR (dock) and strikE (end of)
27 HUSSARS Old cavalrymen back in South America, a hundred escaping injuries (7)
soutH (final letter, back in)) US (America) then ScARS (injuries) missing C (a hundred)
28 INTERIM Meanwhile, waste time in middle of performance (7)
anagram (waste) of TIME IN and perfoRmance (middle of)
Down
1 CAKING A man under roof of chapel is plastering (6)
A KING (chess man) under Chapel (first letter, roof of)
2 BLOTTO Brahms and Liszt for starters, German is sozzled (6)
first letters (for starters) of Brahms and Liszt then OTTO (a German)
3 RUST BUCKET Vessel beneath reddish-brown banger (4,6)
RUST (reddish-brown) and BUCKET (vessel)
4 TOTAL Complete wreck (5)
double definition
5 DONATELLO Give pair of lines love as an artist (9)
DONATE (give) LL (line, pair of) and O (love, tennis score)
6 ODIN Artist shaving head for god (4)
rODIN (artist) missing first letter (shaving head)
7 LIPCHITZ Note zigzagging lines under rim, as artist (8)
CHIT (note) then Z (zigzagging lines) following (under) LIP (rim)
8 STODDART Classic marks arising for artist (8)
TRAD (classic) and DOTS (marks) all reversed (arising)
13 LAUNDROMAT Slotting in money initially, turn a load around — here? (10)
anagram (around) of  TURN A LOAD containing Money (initial letter of)
15 ODOURLESS Short of bees, audibly, lob rosebuds away — as not humming? (9)
anagram (away) of LOb ROSEbUDS missing BB (sounds like bees)
16 HEPWORTH The value of cool artist (8)
the WORTH (value) of HEP (cool) – Barbara Hepworth
17 BUTTOCKS Too much to raise in dollars for the seated area (8)
OTT (too much) reversed (to raise) in BUCKS (dollars)
19 KAPOOR Kandinsky originally a substandard artist (6)
Kadinsky (first letter of, originally) A and POOR (substandard)
20 ESTEEM Judge is introduced to magistrate finally, when standing (6)
MEETS (is introduced to) with magistratE all reversed (when standing)
23 SWAZI African lover endlessly cuddles Zambian leader (5)
SWAIn (lover, endless) contains Zambian (leading letter of)
24 SOFA Comfortable seat, up until now, finally lost (4)
SO FAr (up till now) missing final letter

*anagram
definitions are underlined

28 comments on “Guardian Prize 26,872 by Paul”

  1. Thanks PeeDee. I’ve noted before that I think Paul’s puzzles are becoming more difficult and I found this one no exception. I learned the names of artists, and sculptors, that I had not encountered before including, I am ashamed to say, Margaret Stoddart. I never did explain ROCK OPERA to myself but I now find that KOP derives from Spion Kop, which I have visited, because of the resemblance of the Anfield grandstand to that hill. Mudd indeed.

  2. Thanks to Paul and PeeDee. I could not parse ROCK OPERA and HUSSARS but did get the various artists and make it through. There’s a typo in 23d (SAWin for SWAin) and 14ac “stream” provides the anagram for MASTER. A good workout for me.

  3. I began to flounder with half a dozen to go, but got the last four down-clue artists with a hunch and an o/l check. It took a while to see the cleverness in WIT. Failed to explicate HUSSARS, apart from the definition, and couldn’t make proper sense of 25A despite latching on to the KOP aspect – so thanks PeeDee for those, et al.

  4. Thanks to Peedee and, as ever, to Paul. I got there in the end but needed quite a few explanations for the parsing. Could somebody please explain “cat” in 1a?

  5. Thanks Paul and PeeDee
    I think (though I might be wrong) that more specifically all the artists are principally sculptors.
    crosser @4 – a female breeding cat is called a “queen”.

  6. Thanks Paul and PeeDee. I must confess to a heavy reliance on an encyclopaedia list of sculptors once I saw 6d ODIN. I hadn’t heard of most of the names so lots of guesses from the crossers.

    Had to give up on 25a which I thought was ROCK ARENA (TV show?) and so could not solve 24d either. Stuck in CASA thinking “comfortable seat” might refer to a house.

    So not happy with myself; also had to come here for explanations of several that I got without knowing why.

    I did enjoy 3a RUST BUCKET and 17d BUTTOCKS.

    All up, too difficult for me, but certainly grateful for an expanded knowledge of sculptors!

  7. This one would have failed the train test, though I was at home resting a sore knee so that didn’t matter – needed to check LIPCHITZ who I’d never heard of – STODDART the artist was unfamiliar too but easy enough to deduce. Apart from those it wasn’t the most difficult Paul we’ve seen recently, but all still fairly entertaining.

    Thanks to Paul and PeeDee

  8. Thanks Paul and PeeDee.

    I enjoyed this ROCK OPERA, even though I could not parse that particular clue. Some of the artists names were new to me, and at first I had the New Zealand artist Margaret STODDART in mind for 8d, rather an odd choice I thought, but later realised we were dealing with sculptors so Googled and came up with Alexander (Sandy).

  9. BH @7
    I got lucky with LIPCHITZ. I knew that LIPSHITZ was a name (though I couldn’t parse the middle bit, or course!), so I put LIPSHITZ ARTIST into Google, which helpfully returned “Did you mean LIPCHITZ ARTIST?”

  10. Thanks Paul & PeeDee.

    Had to check a couple of sculptors but it all went in although I failed to parse ROCK OPERA & HUSSARS properly (I thought the ‘back’ meant HUS <, which gave 'suh,' HOD <)

    Not sure what 'Give pair of lines love as an artist' means but overall an entertaining solve.

  11. Nice puzzle as usual from this setter. As regards the level of difficulty: I think Paul’s puzzles are on a spectrum which goes from “very straightforward to bloody difficult”. This one was somewhere in the middle. Whatever the level the puzzles are always entertaining as this one is.
    That said,I had to look up most of the sculptors and I had some trouble with HUSSARS but nothing detracted from my enjoyment.
    Thanks Paul.

    P.S. Congratulations to Sadiq Khan.

  12. I usually enjoy Paul’s puzzles and this was no exception. I knew some of the artists but had to try to figure out a couple of them and then look them up.

    Robi @10 – the surface of 5D is a bit clunky, but could just about make sense, if you think of an artist painting a couple of lines in a spirit of love. But I didn’t understand the surface of 10A – “Prison reforms attributed to figure in racketeer?” What is “figure in racketeer” supposed to mean?

  13. P.S. also note this, in relation to the clue’s wording, “Stoddart associates the lack of form in modern art with social decay; in contrast, his works include many classical allusions.”

  14. Nice one! Had to do a lot of looking up, but, as it’s a favourite hobby of mine, I never complain about that – learned plenty of new names in the process. Good wordplay made it easy. Many lovely surfaces, notably 13d.

    Thank you Paul & PeeDee.

  15. Challenging but fair and enjoyable. For once, I saw the theme, though LIPCHITZ and STODDART were new to me.

    Thanks, Paul and PeeDee.

  16. Thanks Paul and PeeDee

    Did this one yesterday on a rainy Mother’s Day over here. Started it and got most of the top half completed before going to a lunch buffet with the lady of the day ! Took a long time to break into the bottom until I finally saw HEPWORTH and ODOURLESS.

    Was another who could not parse ROCK OPERA (even after thinking of ROC and ERA at various points of time) and HUSSARS (kept having HARMS in mind and wondering how M = a hundred).

    Finished in the SE corner with CROSSROADS, ESTEEM (a new definition for me) and MOORE (one of many sculptors that I had to check on after resolving the word play). Have been finding Paul presenting generally harder puzzles over the past month or two – but they always remain a joy to solve.

  17. Nobody seems to have explicitly mentioned (although Cookie, at least, was clearly aware) that ROCK OPERA (sing. OPUS) are what sculptors create.

  18. Thanks all
    Rather unsatisfying: 21, 25 and 27. across all “solved” but unparsed and barely accepting of the explanations here.

  19. Jim@ 14
    The figure is ten needed to complete the anagram.
    Racketeer it the definition

  20. Tony @27 – thanks for pointing that out I had not spotted it at all, it went straight over my head. There again I didn’t even know all the artists here were sculptors so I wasn’t ever likely to offer any useful insights into this theme!

  21. RCWhiting @23
    Yes I understand the working of the clue – it’s just the surface that doesn’t seem to make sense to me.

  22. An enjoyable puzzle in the main though I’m not generally fond of themes that require much more than general knowledge. Rodin, Moore, and Hepworth, Donatello, Koons, and Kapoor OK but Stoddart and Lipchitz?
    25a I can imagine a fan talking of the Shankly era but when is/was the KOP ERA?
    27a We’ve had this discussion recently but, though I can understand that H is the back(=last) letter in South, I still don’t like it as it is not really in. In this case “back to” wouldn’t have spoiled the surface.

  23. Thanks PeeDee and Paul.

    Yes I did need to look up KOONS, LIPCHITZ and STODDART but beautifully clued so no problems – and this shouldn’t be an issue for a ‘weekend’ puzzle when solvers can be expected to have reference material to hand (though in my case, and late as ever) I just finished this morning.

    Loved the signature “seating area” at 17 down.

    Great fun.

  24. Hamish – I thought the same about 17dn “seating area”, nicely understated. I didn’t mention this in the blog as I have found that discussing Paul’s humour generates too much argument.

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