With only hours to go before reaching a very familiar point on the cycle of life it should be a time for thoughtful reflection on the past year. But I’m buggered if I’m going to bring myself down in such a predictable way. Instead, a shallow thoughtless reflection on the past 48 hours.
After vegging around with Tony and Humph for a day or so, Tony and I went up to Camden and met Andy. We went for some sushi and Tony wanted to eat some “weird” food. It’s been a while since I had sushi and afterwards I remembered why. Delicious food certainly; in harmonious, beautiful, artistic, tiny quantities that cost a shocking amount of money. But you’re also paying for the smug feeling of wellbeing and sophistication that swells in your stomach afterwards I spose. After this we had a pint in “the black cap” and flicked through QX which is a good way to make even the most well endowed heterosexual man feel inadequate…. I also remembered that I was in loco parentis to a ball of feather so went back home and watched BBC2’s selection of late night excellent comedy programmes.
The next day started of very productively – cleaned out the bird, did some washing up, washed a load of clothes etc etc etc. After such a lot of worthy productivity I went out with Mod and Ian to the Tate Modern. I’ve always wanted to go but never got round to it. If you’ve neever been, then go! No, just go! Go! OK there are plenty of opportunities for thinking things like “this is simply shit”, “a five year old could do better than that”,” this guy’s taking the piss” and “I don’t know about art but I know bollocks when I see it”, but you’ll also find things that really do make you stop and stare. Some of the stuff there is truly disturbing and even awe inspiring. Mod deliberately took us through the entrance in the “turbine room” where there is currently an installation called the weather project. This is what it looks like as you walk in. The room is indescribably large and there’s a layer of mist floating half way up. The entire ceiling is mirrored make the place look even more voluminous. Th e only light comes from the huge half sun at the end of the hall which, as a result of the mirrors, looks like an upside down sunset shimmering. It really made me short of breath. The scene was like something out of close-encounters with an army of open-mouthed people and childrens slowly walking towards the sun like possessed zombies. As you get deeper into the room people are sitting and lying down – a most bizarre sight, like a surreal silent festival. But when you lie down and see yourself hundreds of feet in the air, looking down from the mirror at all feels a little strange. There’s a shot of Whisky to for the person who find me in either of those pictures.
After about half an hour of lying on the cold floor waving at a reflection 100s of feet away we had a look at a few exhibits and tried to say “that’s the perfect space for an installation like this” about everything we saw and eventually wanderd off spending the rest of the afternoon/evening in the pub. Mod and Ian truly regretted persuading me to stay until the end because I launched into a series of rants….sorry guys.
