a (quick) look back on london
(waiting by a jazz bar at the smithfield market)
Monday I mentioned that I was only just rejoining the Living (in the American and digital sense) after a brief, unplugged journey overseas. Where was I, you ask? England. London, specifically…though I guess there was an Atlanta “adventure” on the way home, some tangled mess involving a canceled flight and an unlimited amount of South Park.
For the record: the trip itself was fantastic. It was my first time in England, so there was some obligatory touristing. One of the best museums that slid into this category was the deservedly well-known Tate Modern. I was most impressed by the Tate’s exhibition of Miroslaw Balka’s How It Is, an interactive piece where, well, you basically walk into a giant steel structure…
…with a vast dark chamber, which in construction reflects the surrounding architecture – almost as if the interior space of the Turbine Hall has been turned inside out. Hovering somewhere between sculpture and architecture, on 2 metre stilts, it stands 13 metres high and 30 metres long. Visitors can walk underneath it, listening to the echoing sound of footsteps on steel, or enter via a ramp into a pitch black interior, creating a sense of unease.
Not just unease…unless “unease” is shorthand for the incredibly primal feeling of being acutely aware of your senses: smell, touch, taste, sounds…every input but sight.
The picture at the head of this post is totally unrelated to Balka’s work. Just an image from the other end of sensory display: what you can only see, the muted color palette of London in “early spring.” (It was nearly 60 degrees in DC today…We can call it Spring now, right?)
Categories: Look
