A parasite blogs on art, museums & public history

I took my walk with Dickens

8/4/2018

Sun Inn, Canterbury
07/04/2018

"Our memories remain collective... and are recalled to us through others even though only we were participants in the events or saw the things concerned. In reality, we are never alone. Other men (sic) need not be physically present, since we always carry with us and in us a number of distinct persons.

"I arrive for the first time in London and take walks with different companions… Even if I were unaccompanied, I need only have read their varying descriptions of the city, been given advice on what aspects to see, or merely studied a map. Now suppose I went walking alone. Could it be said that I preserve of that tour only individual remembrances, belonging solely to me? Only in appearance did I take a walk alone. Passing before Westminster, I thought about my historian friend's comments (or, what amounts to the same thing, what I have read in history books). Crossing a bridge, I noticed the effects of perspective that were pointed out by my painter friend (or struck me in a picture or engraving). Or I conducted my tour with the aid of a map. Many impressions during my first visit to London – St. Paul's, Mansion House, the Strand, or the Inns of Court – reminded me of Dickens' novels read in childhood, so I took my walk with Dickens. In each of these moments I cannot say that I was alone, that I reflected alone, because I had put myself in thought into this or that group… Other men (sic) have had these remembrances in common with me. Moreover, they help me to recall them. I turn to these people, I momentarily adopt their viewpoint, and I re-enter their group in order to better remember. I can still feel the group's influence and recognize in myself many ideas and ways of thinking that could not have originated with me and that keep me in contact with it."

Maurice Halbwachs, The Collective Memory, trans. F.J. Ditter Jr and V. Yazdi Ditter (New York: Harper & Row, 1980), pp. 23-24.

Messages for posterity

22/10/2012

Cover of the book London's Immortals by John Blackwood

Yesterday a group of people gathered in Custom House Square, Belfast. They then opened three large freezers, removed 1,517 diminutive frozen figures and began placing them around the square. When the task was complete they stood back and spent the next twenty minutes watching as these human icicles melted before their eyes.

This happening was part of a festival to mark the centenary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic.

The person responsible for this particular commemorative response was the Brazilian born artist, Néle Azevedo (born 1950). Her poignant idea was entitled, Minimum Monument. It was intended as a celebration of the “ephemeral and diminutive, as opposed to what is monumental and grandiose.”(1)

For instances of the “monumental and grandiose” one might turn to John Blackwood’s book London’s Immortals: The complete commemorative outdoor statues (Savoy Press, 1989). The cover features an individual who exudes monumentality and grandiosity. This is all the more remarkable given that the person being represented is physically frail – so weak in fact that he requires a walking stick to support his gargantuan frame. But his greatness comes from the courage of his convictions rather than the strength of his sinews. The bronze effigy commemorates a man who is seemingly so famous that he requires no elaborate inscription. On the pedestal on which he is placed is but a single word: Churchill.

Statues of this nature are intended to create the illusion of universal acclaim and permanence. This façade came crashing down during my investigations into this sculpture and the other commemorative monuments that surround the Houses of Parliament in London. In the year 2000 a riot broke out where the natural order was inverted: protestors mounted Churchill’s plinth and daubed it with graffiti. In the process they turned the war hero into a bloated warmonger. For a short time this establishment figure became a punk icon (courtesy of the grass mohican draped over his pate).(2)

I wonder what the late, great playwright and author, Dennis Potter would have made of such bad behaviour? I ask because, way back in 1967 in one of his earliest plays for television, Potter took a “swipe at Churchillianism”.(3) Alas, the original recordings of this and two other such works were subsequently deleted by the BBC.

Years later Potter reflected on his vanished play. He dismissed it as “polemical” and “overtly political”, something with which now felt uncomfortable.(4) We are not in a position to judge if he was right to be so self-critical given that the work no longer exists. This makes the title of the play deeply ironic. It was called, Message for Posterity.

That phrase sums up Ivor Roberts Jones’s titanic statue of Churchill that has scowled at parliament ever since its inauguration in 1973.

But messages for posterity do not always have to be like this. They can be more modest and far less bombastic – like Néle Azevedo’s already vanished tribute to the 1,517 lives cut short when the monumental and grandiose prow of the Titanic sank beneath the icy waves of the North Atlantic Ocean.

____
Notes

(1) Nuala McCann, “Poignant ice tribute to Titanic victims”, BBC News, 21/10/2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-20020498
(2) For more about this, see my doctoral thesis, On Stage at the Theatre of State: The Monuments and Memorials in Parliament Square, London (A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Nottingham Trent University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, March 2003).
(3) Graham Fuller (ed.), Potter on Potter, London, Faber and Faber, 1993, p. 17.
(4) Potter on Potter, pp. 31-32.

Jimmy Savile and damnatio memoriae

10/10/2012

The British Museum possesses many thousands of fascinating objects. One of its self-styled “highlights” is a rather plain looking marble inscription. It comes from Rome and is dated around AD 193-211. What makes it so interesting are the things it does not show. These include the names of two relatives of the Roman emperor, Septimius Severus (AD 145-211), namely his daughter-in-law Plautilla and his son Geta. The latter was murdered by Septimius Severus’ other son Caracalla. He was Plautilla’s husband and Geta’s brother. The two siblings were bitter rivals following the death of their father. It is believed that Caracalla murdered Geta and then had his treacherous and much despised wife executed. And, to make matters even worse, they were then subjected to the posthumous punishment of damnatio memoriae:

   their names were expunged from all official records and inscriptions
   and their statues and all images of them were destroyed.
   This process [damnatio memoriae] was the most horrendous fate
   a Roman could suffer, as it removed him from the memory of society.(1)

However, removing Geta from public consciousness was not a straightforward matter. Caracalla was obliged to give his brother a proper funeral and burial due to Geta’s popularity both with the Roman army and among substantial sections of Roman society. This explains why the names of Geta and Plautilla were included on the British Museum’s marble inscription, only to be scratched out later on.

Why am I mentioning all this? Because a modern-day form of damnatio memoriae is currently unfolding in British society. This is in relation to the disc jockey, children’s television presenter and media celebrity, Sir Jimmy Savile OBE, KCSG, LLD (1926-2011). When he died last year at the ripe old age of 84 he was hailed a loveable hero who had done much for charity. Now, however, revelations have come to light suggesting that he was, in the words of the police, a “predatory sex offender”.(2)

As a result, strenuous efforts are being made to expunge him from the public record.(3) Thus, the charity that bears his name is considering a rebrand. A plaque attached to his former home in Scarborough was vandalised and has since been removed. So too has the sign denoting “Savile’s View” in the same town. Meanwhile, in Leeds, his name has been deleted from a list of great achievers at the Civic Hall. A statue in Glasgow has been taken down in an act of officially sanctioned iconoclasm. The same fate has been dished out to the elaborate headstone marking Savile’s grave. This last-named act of damnatio memoriae is in some ways a pity given the unintended poignancy of the epitaph inscribed on the stone: “It Was Good While It Lasted”. It was almost as if Savile knew that he would one day have to atone for his evil deeds.

Atonement has, alas, come too late for those that suffered at the hands of Savile. To make matters worse, his considerable fame has been replaced by a burgeoning notoriety. This is reminiscent of the damnatio memoriae that befell Geta and his sister-in-law Plautilla. The marble inscription that once carried their name is a “highlight” of the British Museum precisely because of the dark deeds associated with them and the futile efforts made to delete them from history. In their case, damnatio memoriae has, in a perverse way, enhanced their posthumous status centuries after their grisly deaths. Let’s hope that the same will not be said of the late Jimmy Savile – an individual who has gone from saint to scoundrel in the space of just a few short months.

___
Notes

(1) “Marble inscription with damnatio memoriae of Geta, son of Septimius Severus” (Roman, AD 193-211, from Rome, Italy, height 81.5 cm, width 47.5 cm, British Museum, Townley Collection, GR 1805.7-3.210, http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/gr/m/marble_inscription.aspx).
(2) Martin Beckford, “Sir Jimmy Savile was a ‘predatory sex offender’, police say”, The Daily Telegraph, 09/10/2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9597158/Sir-Jimmy-Savile-was-a-predatory-sex-offender-police-say.html.
(3) “Jimmy Savile’s headstone removed from Scarborough cemetery” and “Sir Jimmy Savile Scarborough footpath sign removed”, BBC News, 12/10 & 08/10/2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-19893373 and www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-19867893.

Monuments are as fugitive as the years

1/9/2012

The Barbara Tower at the New Palace of Westminster

“The places that we have known belong now only to the little world of space
on which we map them for our own convenience.
None of them was ever more than a thin slice,
held between the contiguous impressions that composed our life at that time;
remembrance of a particular form is but regret for a particular moment;
and houses, roads, avenues are as fugitive, alas, as the years.”

Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past, Volume I,
translated by Charles Kenneth Scott-Moncrieff

Every Friday buries a Thursday

16/6/2012

Images to celebrate James Joyce’s Ulyssess on “Bloomsday” – 16th June.

Patriotism is not enough

8/6/2012

Edith Cavell (1865-1915)

Jubifree!

5/6/2012

Maidstone Museum mutates

2/6/2012

Images to accompany my recent exhibition review of Maidstone Museum & Bentlif Art Gallery in the county of Kent (Museums Journal, Issue 112 (05), pp. 54-57).

The museum is rightly grateful to that most capacious of collectors, Julius Brenchley (1816-73). This hoarder has been mentioned in an earlier blog posting, which also alluded to the bedroom antics of Maidstone Museum’s former curator, William Lightfoot. See “Brenchley's bedroom benefaction”.

The Queen is (still not) Dead

2/6/2012

The weather in Stockholm today is terrible.

This is precisely the sort of thing that kills me. What happens whenever I feel like going for a nice walk where it’s quiet and dry? The rain pours down and flattens my hair, that’s what.

I wonder what it’s like back in dear old Blighty?

On second thoughts, I don’t really care: I’ve said farewell to that particular land’s cheerless marshes. I swear it’s the last time I sit on a delayed, overcrowded train stuck among the railway arches somewhere between London, Liverpool, Leeds or Birmingham. There’s nothing worse than being hemmed in like a boar.

Even so, I’d still like to go back now and then to chat about precious things.

But, really, the things you read in the British newspapers! All those jeremy hunts spouting inane rubbish about love, law and poverty.

Perhaps it’s just me, but don’t the way things are going make you wonder if the world has changed? I don’t trust anyone these days, not with all the lies they make up. True, people don’t have long hair any more. And all the pubs have shut down together with the churches. But the liars are still at large: everyone’s out to snatch your money or wreck your body.

God, my limbs ache. And it feels so lonely, despite being hemmed in by so many bores.

And the media doesn’t help either. I read about a gang of kids peddling drugs. Honest to God, I never even knew what drugs were at their age. I was too tied to my mother’s apron strings to worry about incarceration, castration or coronations.

Actually, that reminds me of one bright spot to brighten up Blighty’s cheerless marshes. Did you see that picture on the front of the other day’s Daily Mail? I know she only suffered mild concussion, but it was a really wonderful thing to see her royal lowness all bandaged up and with her head in a sling.

I wonder what Charles thought when he saw it? He’d probably liked to have been the monarch on the front cover, veiled in some regalia nicked from his mum.

Why is it that he of all people should be next in line for regality? I bet if the libraries or archives were still open any one of us could find some historical facts to prove that they are a pale descendent of some old queen from eighteen generations back.

No-one cares of course. Especially not those flag-waving patriots hemmed in like boars along their rain-soaked street parties that stretch from London to Liverpool, Leeds to Birmingham.

Honestly, the only way to get them to listen would be to break into Buckingham Palace armed with just a rusty spanner hidden inside a sponge.

Sneaking past Charles wouldn’t be difficult: he’d be too busy struggling into his mater’s bridal veil and practicing his coronation steps to notice me flit past.

And I bet his mother would confuse me for someone else:

“Eh, I know you”, she’d rasp, “and you cannot sing”.

“That’s nothing”, I’d reply whilst prising my corroded tool from its soft wrapping: “you should hear me play piano”.

This won’t happen, of course. It’s raining too hard for me to venture out.

So I may as well stay here where it’s quiet and dry.

Perhaps I’ll take a surreptitious peek at the Daily Mail online. Oh, look! It says here that the queen has just taken a nasty tumble...

Morrissey/Marr (with Mills, Godfrey & Scott)
“The Queen Is Dead (Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty)”
The Queen is Dead, Rough Trade / Sire, 1986, 6:24

Sharp objects cause nasty pricks

22/5/2012

0 Comments

(After) Brett Murray's "The Spear"

See "Jacob Zuma painting vandalised in South Africa gallery"
BBC News, 22/05/2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18159204

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Who will police the London Olympics?

14/5/2012

Security measures are being put into place to safeguard the much-heralded London Olympics.

It comes as a blessed relief to discover that the streets of Britain’s Megacity are to be patrolled by thousands of military personnel. The skies above will echo to the roar of attack aircraft. The waters will be awash with warships. Meanwhile, tower blocks in the vicinity will house surface-to-air missiles. Networks of surveillance cameras will monitor the streets.

And rest assured that, in the unlikely event that disturbances should occur, sonic cannons will be swiftly deployed. They will be wielded by the “tens of thousands of troops and private security guards working alongside police officers and the security services”.

But how will honest, law-abiding citizens recognize these guardians of the peace? Well, I can exclusively reveal the new-look uniforms with which they are to be issued (see image). Of course, should you be fortunate enough to come across such an operative, you will be left in no doubt.

They are just what Britain needs in these troubled times of austerity: judge, jury and executioner rolled into one.

Chief among these lawgivers is Judge Dredd of Dennis Potter Block in the Brimstone-&-Treacle Sector. He has already seen service at the first Luna Olympics.

When asked if he had a message for any olympian perps, muties, monsters and fatties, Dredd replied simply: I AM the law.

And with that in mind, let the Brit-Cit games begin!

Meet me at the meat museum man

7/4/2012

Danny Robins and a Sweden without Saab

30/3/2012

Saab AB Carl Gustav 84mm Recoilless Rifle. The best multi-purpose weapon there is

Danny Robins has a voice like Tony Blair and loves Sweden with the same intensity as does David Cameron and his "free" school sidekick, Michael Gove.

Like me, Danny is married to a Swede. Yet the Sweden that he conjures up in BBC Radio 4's The Swedish Invasion is no place that I've ever visited.(1)

But then again, unlike Danny Robins, I've never exterminated an elk in Eksjö...

In his programme Danny salivates about the land that "gave us IKEA, Volvo and Abba". It is, of course, also the country that rocks our world with top-design products like Saab AB's Carl Gustav 84mm Recoilless Rifle: "The best multi-purpose weapon there is".(2)

This globally exported grenade launcher is in fact so potent that it shares its name with the king of Sweden.

Alas, there was no time for Danny to discuss Sweden's burgeoning weapons export industry.(3) This is a real pity because, if he had focused on this aspect of "the Swedish invasion", he might have squeezed in an interview with Sweden's former defence minister, Sten Tolgfors. Mr Tolgfors resigned yesterday in the wake of reports that he had sanctioned covert Swedish support for the construction of a weapons factory in Saudi Arabia.(4)

But why should we trouble our pretty blonde heads with such things? It's far nicer to seek out a snug, "mysig” IKEA-furnished corner and lose oneself in Steig Larsson's cosy world of rape and murder.

Pure fiction, Danny, eller hur?

____
Notes

(1) Jo Wheeler (producer), The Swedish Invasion, "An Unique" production for BBC Radio 4, broadcast 30/03/2012 and available to listen for seven days. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b010k2f6.
(2) "Carl-Gustaf M3 - Weapon System: The best multi-purpose weapon there is", http://www.saabgroup.com/Land/Weapon-Systems/support-weapons/Carl_Gustaf_M3_weapon_system.
(3) Read more about this explosive aspect of the "Swedish Invasion" in my soon-to-be-published paper, "Banal Nordism: Recomposing an Old Song of Peace".
(4) "Swedish Defence Minister Tolgfors quits over Saudi deal", BBC News, 29/032012, accessed 30/03/2012 at, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17548390.

Cromwell Tower and the all-New Palace at Westminster

25/3/2012

I am a republican with little interest in the pharmaceutical industry. This summer will therefore be a testing time for me, what with London hosting the Olympic Games and the British monarch celebrating her diamond jubilee.

Fortunately these two events are only temporary. They will, however, leave lasting legacies. One such is the 175,000 m2 Westfield Stratford City shopping centre. Britain’s gold medal haul would really rocket if the "Retail Relay" were to become an Olympic event.

Heaven on earth is now a reality for the shoppers of London.

Meanwhile, another legacy project has yet to be accomplished. And, in an effort to help ensure that it remains that way, I have rushed to my keyboard with the same zeal as a drug-fuelled athlete reacting to the boom of the starting pistol.

For it grieves me to report that a group of cretinous politicians are proposing to turn the Houses of Parliament's "Big Ben" into the "Elizabeth Tower" in honour of our dear old queen.(1)

Now, a number of arguments can be deployed to support this obsequious suggestion.

Firstly, the name change wouldn't really matter. The vast majority of locals and visitors would continue to mistakenly refer to it as "Big Ben". Its proper – and far more mundane title – is simply "the Clock Tower". Big Ben alludes to its great bell, which in turn is probably a reference to the politician and engineer, Sir Benjamin Hall (1802-67).

Secondly, the re-christening would bring this iconic symbol in line with the Victoria Tower on the other side of the building. This erection takes its name from Queen Victoria, Britain's erstwhile longest-serving monarch.

Ditching Ben in favour of Liz would add yet another royal epithet to the Houses of Parliament – or, to give it its formal designation: the New Palace at Westminster. This title reflects the fact that Sir Charles Barry's architectural fantasy arose from the ashes of the old palace. Only Westminster Hall survived the inferno that engulfed this ancient edifice in 1834.

The centuries-old Westminster Hall is skilfully integrated into Barry's neo-gothic design. Earlier this month the queen paid it a visit in order to witness the unveiling of a stained-glass window to mark her jubilee.(2)

As she looked up at this glittering tribute, I wonder if she spared a thought for Charles I? For it was in that very same building way back in January 1649 that this soon-to-be-beheaded monarch was put on trial – and sentenced to death.

Charles's nemesis was Oliver Cromwell.

Cromwell was still causing a right royal rumpus two centuries later. This was in relation to the decorative scheme planned for the New Palace at Westminster. If you look carefully you'll see that parliament's façade is festooned with statues of the various kings and queens that have ruled England and Britain through the ages.

This carved history posed a dilemma to its designers: what should be done about Cromwell?

For the sake of historical accuracy and completeness he ought to have been slotted in between Charles I (executed in 1649) and his son, Charles II (restored to the throne in 1660).

But placing a regicide in a royalist pantheon proved to be a commemorative step too far.(3) Cromwell was sculpturally excised from British history. Not until the very end of the 19th century was the Lord Protector rewarded with a statue. He stands there to this day: at one remove, deep in thought and with his back turned to parliament.(4)

So, whether you like it or not, Cromwell is part of Britain's political and monarchical history. If "Big Ben" must have new nomenclature, then it should from this year on be known as "Cromwell Tower".

What better way to mark Queen Elizabeth's jubilee? A silent admonition not only to this monarch but to all her heirs: they occupy positions of privilege and power not by right but by accidents of birth.

Other, far less anachronistic and slightly more democratic systems are possible.

The Cromwell Tower will remind the House of Windsor and all their subjects that we should not take the status quo for granted.

God Save the Queen!

____
Notes
(1) James Chapman, "Bong! Will Big Ben tower be renamed after the Queen? MPs call for the London landmark to be renamed for the Diamond Jubilee", Daily Mail, 23/03/2012, accessed 25/03/2012 at, www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2118999/Big-Ben-renamed-Elizabeth-Tower-Queen.html.
(2) Jon Craig, "Westminster To Honour Queen's Diamond Jubilee", Sky News, 20/03/2012, accessed 25/03/2012 at, http://news.sky.com/home/politics/article/16192187.
(3) The phrase "A regicide in a royalist pantheon" appears in the fifth chapter of my PhD, which concerned the commemorative history and symbolism of parliament and the adjacent square. See Stuart Burch, On Stage at the Theatre of State: The Monuments and Memorials in Parliament Square, London (Nottingham Trent University, 2003).
(4) The stupendous statue of Cromwell - with bible in one hand and sword in the other - was made by Sir William Hamo Thornycroft RA (1850-1925) and completed (without an unveiling ceremony) in 1899. Ever since 1950 he has stood face-to-face with a lead bust of Charles I inserted into a niche on the façade of St. Margaret's Church opposite...
... as can be seen below:

Jebediah Springfield apes Colonel George Taylor

19/2/2012

Nottingham, not Newcastle

18/2/2012

First Duke of Newcastle on Nottingham Castle

Sculptor: Sir William Wilson (1641-1710), c.1680

William Cavendish, the First Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne
is notable in Nottingham not Newcastle
on the site of a slighted castle that has been unfortified
upon the façade of a fired house that is no longer a home
above a door that is now a window
that looks into a room without a floor
of a pioneering public art gallery
which has now been
privatized behind a paywall.

Nicholas Hawksmoor drawing of Nottingham Castle c. 1685

From a sketch by Nicholas Hawksmoor, c. 1685

Walk Don't Walk

13/2/2012

Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Washington D.C.

Snake in the grass

30/12/2011

Crocodile tears

22/12/2011

Cut Croc (or) Lacerated Lacoste

Earlier this month it was announced that a series of London-based museums would be renewing their £10m sponsorship deals with BP.(1) These initials - BP - are derived from "British Petroleum", the name the company adopted in 1954.

Some people feel that it is inappropriate for institutions like Tate or the British Museum to accept money from an oil company responsible for such environmental disasters as the Sea Gem oil rig collapse (1965), the Texas City Refinery explosion (2005) and the Deepwater Horizon well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico (2010).

However, as the firm is keen to stress, BP means "Beyond Petroleum". Associating itself with art and culture is therefore good for business.

But is it good for society?

Recipients of financial support - be it in the form of public grants or private sponsorship - need to guard against undue influence or censorship. A cautionary tale is provided by this year's Lacoste Prize at the Musée de l'Elysée in Lausanne, Switzerland. Despite claims to the contrary, it appears that pressure from the sponsor has led to the cancellation of the award.(2) This seems to have been triggered by the Jerusalem-born artist Larissa Sansour and her artwork, Nation Estate (2011-12). Inspired by Palestine's bid for nation status at the UN, Sansour has opted to imagine a dystopian vision of a future world in which the

    Palestinians have their state in the form of a single skyscraper: the Nation Estate.
    Surrounded by a concrete wall, this colossal hi-rise houses the entire Palestinian
    population - finally living the high life. Each city has its own floor: Jerusalem, third floor;
    Ramallah, fourth floor. Intercity trips previously marred by checkpoints are now made
    by elevator.

    Aiming for a sense of belonging, the lobby of each floor re-enacts iconic squares and
    landmarks - elevator doors on the Jerusalem floor opening onto a full-scale
    Dome of the Rock. Built outside the actual city of Jerusalem, the building also has
    views of the original golden dome from the top floors.(3)

Executives at Lacoste felt that all this was a far cry from the competition's theme of happiness ("joie de vivre"). Lacoste's sweet little "green crocodile logo" was clearly about to lose its cheeky grin.(4) So the company sought to close the elevator doors on Larissa Sansour's Nation Estate.

If this was their intention, then the opposite has transpired. I would never have heard of Larissa Sansour or her thought-provoking sci-fi skyscraper without the helpful intervention of Lacoste.

So perhaps private sponsorship isn't such a bad thing after all?

____
Notes

(1) Mark Brown, "Galleries renew £10m BP deal despite environmental protests", Guardian, 19/12/2012, accessed 22/12/2012 at, http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2011/dec/19/galleries-renew-bp-deal-protests.
(2) "Lacoste Prize cancelled amid censorship row", BBC News, 22/12/2012, accessed 22/12/2012 at, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16299688.
(3) "Nation Estate", accessed 22/12/2012 at, http://www.larissasansour.com/nation_estate.html.
(4) "Lacoste logo", accessed 22/12/2012 at, http://www.famouslogos.us/lacoste-logo.

There are no pockets in a shroud

22/11/2011

Manhattan (25/03/2008)

Ruddington remembers

13/11/2011

Heritage: the brutal truth

7/10/2011

A Liberty Bell lover (19/03/2008)

Our museums and history books are full of emblems of struggle. Take the Liberty Bell, for example. It is not a terribly attractive thing. And it is poorly manufactured too. A large crack has long rendered it useless as a functioning object. Yet this does not stop millions of people taking the pilgrimage to Philadelphia to see it. Thanks to its spurious connections with the Declaration of Independence of 1776, this faulty relic has become "one of the most prominent and widely recognized symbols of America" (Callahan 1999: 57). As the ultimate sign of struggle it merits preservation as a cherished icon of national heritage.

In the light of such a precedent, one might have thought that another "emblem of... struggle" would deserve similar protection, even if it "holds no special architectural or historic interest".

The artefact in question is a steel, wood and rubber gateway leading to Dale Farm near Basildon in the English county of Essex. It has been constructed by travellers who have lived on the site for many years. Their presence has led to a long-running legal battle. Now, with the prospect of being forcibly evicted, the travellers' leaders approached English Heritage and asked them to grant listed status to the gateway leading to their homes. This portal has become both a protective barrier and a backdrop for protest banners advertising their cause. As such it has become an "emblem of a struggle for traveller rights" (cited in BBC 2011).

The travellers' application was nevertheless rejected by the current Heritage Minister, John Penrose. After taking advice from English Heritage, he concluded:

        "Although clearly a structure which is significant for the travellers at Dale Farm, the tubular steel,
        wood and rubber construction holds no special architectural or historic interest and does not
        therefore meet the criteria for listing" (cited in Milne 2011).

The traveller community lacks the wherewithal to turn "their heritage" into "national heritage". Because be in no doubt: heritage is never truly universal. The National Trust might now have four million members, but its definition of heritage is no more national than it is natural or neutral.

This can be illustrated by the case of Birmingham Central Library. How many card-carrying National Trust members believe that John Madin's "raw concrete" Brutalist building from 1974 constitutes "heritage"? John Penrose's predecessor in government certainly didn't think so. In 2009, Margaret Hodge - the then Minister for Culture and Tourism - went against the advice of English Heritage by rejecting a bid that would have seen it listed (Waite 2009). It is therefore at just as high a risk of demolition as Dale Farm's gateway. Neither are heritage. Why? Because the likes of Penrose and Hodge say so.

The residents of Dale Farm are unlikely to attract many architectural historians to their cause. Birmingham Central Library fares rather better. It has drawn the support of the World Monuments Fund (WMF). The library, together with Preston bus station (Ingham, Wilson & Stazicker, 1968-9), has been included on WMF's "mounments at risk" list under the mantra "British Brutalism" (WMF 2012). These two secular icons have some unlikely sacred bedfellows in the shape of Newstead Abbey in Nottinghamshire; the ruins of the former cathedral church of St Michael in Coventry; and Quarr Abbey on the Isle of Wight.

What will future generations say if the Dale Farm gateway and British Brutalism are destroyed? The brutal truth is that no one knows (Williams 2008: 7).

We should instead focus on the here-and-now. If a cracked old bell can attract millions of worshippers, then there is absolutely nothing to stop any old bit of concrete or steel becoming heritage. The trick is to convince enough people of something's worth - and then transform that minority interest into "our" heritage: a precious resource that simply must be protected in perpetuity.

This isn't some innocent pastime: "preservation is an act of making future generations understand what we want them to know about the past" (Williams 2008: 7). Thus to refuse to safeguard something by denying it the status of "heritage" is to attempt a double erasure: firstly from the landscape of the present and, secondly, from the annals of future history.

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References

BBC (2011) "Dale Farm gateway listing bid rejected", BBC News, 28/09, accessed 07/10/2011 at,
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-15087217
Callahan, Robey (1999) "The Liberty Bell: From Commodity to Sacred Object", Journal of Material Culture,
    Vol. 4, Iss. 1, pp. 57-78
Milne, Roger (2011) "Dale Farm listing bid fails", Planning Portal, 29/09, accessed 07/10/2011 at,
    http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/general/news/stories/2011/sep11/290911/290911_3
Waite, Richard (2009) "Hodge refuses to list Birmingham Central Library", The Architects' Journal, 23/11,
    accessed 07/10/2011 at,
    http://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/daily-news/hodge-refuses-to-list-birmingham-central-library/5211195.article
Williams, Paul (2008) "Going Critical: On the Historic Preservation of the World's First Nuclear Reactor",
    Future Anterior, Vol. 5, Iss. 2, pp. 1-18
WMF (2012) "2012 World Monuments Watch", accessed 07/10/2011 at,
    http://cdn.wmf.org/downloads/2012-Watch-List.pdf

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Supplemental
19/10/2011

The clearing of Dale Farm began today. This prompts further reflection on the decision not to list the barriers around the site. English Heritage couched its response as follows:

    The barricades at Dale Farm do not begin to have the high architectural
    interest essential to meet the criteria for listing on architectural grounds.
    In historic terms, the current case is just too recent for historic importance
    to be a relevant factor.(1)

Aesthetics and temporal factors are thus decisive. Is this always the case? Well, consider the twisted, disfigured steel rods jutting out from the ruins of the World Trade Center on 11th September 2001. Were they of "high architectural interest"? Did judgement have to be deferred to some future date before society could ascertain their "historic importance"? Of course not.

Whatever one's view on the legality of the Dale Farm settlement, don't be fooled by English Heritage's confident dismissal. The gateway to the site did have heritage potential. Only time will tell if future generations will mourn its loss...

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Note

(1) English Heritage (2011) "Dale Farm - Application to list the scaffolding gateway", 29/09, accessed 19/10/2011 at, http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/about/news/dale-farm/

Go West

2/9/2011

In my blog post "Sites of sickening sights" (26/08) I took up the issue of "dark tourism". An example I cited related to the murderers Fred and Rose West, a married couple whose brutal crimes came to light nearly two decades ago. Unbeknown to me, this case has once again become highly topical. This is because the interviews the police conducted with Fred West have formed the basis of a new two-part British television drama.

Whether this is an appropriate topic for primetime viewing is tackled in this week's issue of the Radio Times. It features interviews with the writer of the screenplay, Neil McKay together with its lead actor, Dominic West who plays his namesake. Both men sought to justify their involvement by arguing that their work might save lives by helping alert people to similarly predatory people. The actor referred to a newspaper article written by one of West's daughters that appeared in the Guardian newspaper in the late 1990s: "she ended it by saying the worse thing is that people forget this case and don't discuss it. And that was really my [Dominic West's] moral justification for doing the part" (cited in Midgley 2011: 12).

For his part, Neil McKay, argued that crimes such as those committed by the Wests "shouldn't be swept under the carpet, and left unexamined" (cited in Midgley 2011: 12). There is an irony here given that this is just what has happened at the house where the murders, rapes and abuses took place: it is hidden under a carpet of concrete.

Yet the demolition of the house has not deterred curious tourists, including the Radio Times's own critic, Alison Graham. Her comments in this regard are revealing: "Curiosity and outrage took me to 25 Cromwell Street after it was demolished. I'm not particularly proud, but it was the same compulsion that led me to Ground Zero on a trip to New York... I won't make any cheap, flowery claims that I could feel the terrible silence or hear the restless cries of the dead. I didn't. It's now a pathway to the city centre. Nothing more" (cited in Midgley 2011: 13).

This raises some important questions:

Was the "silence" also all-consuming at Ground Zero - or could the "restless cries of the dead" be heard there? Why should there be a difference?
Is it right to allow 25 Cromwell Street to be "nothing more" than a shortcut - a perverse "path of desire" - to Gloucester city centre?
Is there really no plaque remembering the victims? If so, is this forgetting not also a sort of additional death? A death of remembrance?

With this in mind, perhaps the television drama isn't such a bad thing after all. Howard Ogden remains to be convinced, however. He was Fred West's lawyer in the run-up to the trial. Ogden is quoted as saying: "Victims are forever overlooked and trampled over. I'm more concerned for their feelings than for mine" (cited in Midgley 2011: 12). Interestingly, Ogden reveals that he and his fellow members of the defence team were obliged to wash West's underwear: "Nobody was tending to him... There was no prison officer, there were no regular checks" (cited in Midgley 2011: 12). This must have played its part in allowing West to commit suicide before the trial, meaning that he was never brought to justice. Perhaps the attitudes of the police and the prison officers ought to have been the subject of the television drama? Society's craving for evil scapegoats permits us to forget our own failings and complicities - the sorts of behaviour that allowed Fred and Rose West to kill and abuse for years before anyone noticed.

________
Reference
Midgley, Neil (2011) "Breaking the last taboo", Radio Times, 03-09/09, pp. 10-13

Sounds of the city

27/8/2011

Pedestrian crossing outside Dramaten in Stockholm

Pedestrian crossing near Dramaten, Stockholm

Cities are remarkable but potentially overwhelming places. Our brains are constantly striving to make sense of a flood of sensory information. There is simply too much to take in. So our minds unconsciously filter out extraneous details: sights, sounds, smells, textures - even tastes.

An example of what I mean is contained in the image and sound file included in this blog posting.

What could be more mundane and unremarkable than a street crossing?

Well, as a matter of fact this piece of utilitarian street furniture helps make a place distinct. Shape, colour, design and technology vary from country to country. So too does the "language", i.e. the symbols and sounds. They function like dialects: strange enough to be noteworthy, but familiar enough for us to make sense of them - even if we are visitors from distant lands that possess alternative species of street crossings.

So the clicks and beeps, flashing lights and illuminated signs all play their role in making somewhere familiar or strange.

We could illustrate this by documenting pedestrian crossings in various countries and using the resulting collection of images and sounds as the basis for a compilation of city effects.

Remember too that this would be a snapshot in time. There was an era when the towns and cities of Sweden did not resonate to the clickings of its pedestrian crossings. When did they arrive? Who decided that they should click and not beep? And who determined on the duration of the beat?

These metronomes will surely disappear one day. They'll be replaced with something new or nothing at all. Will Swedes mourn their loss? Or will they listen to the silence, scratch their heads and ask: something's different, something's missing... but I can't quite put my finger on what's changed...

Above: Pedestrian crossing in Stockholm, 27/08/2011, 01:08

Sites of sickening sights

26/8/2011

State Museum, Majdanek near Lublin, 13/11/2008

Tourism takes many forms. One variety goes by such names as dark, disaster or grief tourism. In addition, "Thanatos" - the Greek word for death - has given rise to the concept of thanatourism (Seaton 1996). This has led to an extensive itinerary of "fatal attractions" (Rojek 1999) for "tombstone tourists" to visit (see e.g. Stanton 2003).

The motivations for taking such journeys vary. Travelling to a site of genocide is, for many, a pilgrimage - part of a duty of remembrance and a hope that we might learn from the past to avoid making the same mistakes in the present. Others, however, visit places of death for reasons that are far more prurient. Some people gain positive pleasure and excited curiosity from the pain and suffering of others.

Steps therefore need to be taken to discourage this from happening: to prevent "black spots" (Rojek 1999) of the wrong sort from appearing on the tourist map (1). This explains the decision by Gloucester City Council to purchase a house - and immediately demolish it. The property in question - 25 Cromwell Street - was once the home of Frederick and Rosemary West. They killed women and girls there and hid the bodies around the house and in the garden. The local council saw to it that everything connected with this place of murder was ground to dust. The site was then covered in concrete. These steps were taken in order to stop the relics becoming grisly commodities to be bought and sold by collectors of the macabre (Moyes 1996).

I was reminded of this after reading that the cellar of Josef Fritzl's house is to be pumped with concrete. This should ensure that the place where his daughter was imprisoned can never again be entered. It seems, however, that no decision has been reached regarding the house, which still stands in the Lower Austrian town of Amstetten (AP 2011).

The decision to entomb the Fritzls' cellar might not prevent it from being reopened in the future. Years from now public attitudes could allow it to be carefully restored and made accessible to curious tourists. There is a precedent for this, albeit one that has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with dark tourism: Eidsvoll is a famous tourist attraction in Norway due to its connection with the drawing up of the Norwegian constitution in 1814. In the latter part of the 19th century the cellar of the building was destroyed. It is now being restored ("recreated" might be a better word) in time for the bicentenary of 2014. Some have condemned this decision, arguing that the construction of a "fake" cellar will turn Eidsvoll into "democracy's Disneyland" (Engen 2011).

Norway, of course, is currently trying to come to terms with the terrorist attacks of 22 July that left 77 people dead. The sites of these killings plus all manner of places associated with the terrorist responsible provide fertile ground for dark tourism.

For a final reflection on some of these issues, let's mentally return to Fritzl's cellar. The decision to fill it with concrete is counterproductive. Its transformation has turned it in to an artwork akin to Rachel Whiteread's House (1993). This now-demolished project centred on 193 Grove Road, a regular end-of-terrace Victorian-era house in the East London borough of Tower Hamlets. Whiteread filled the interior with flowcrete. The bricks and roof were then painstakingly removed to reveal the uncanny inside-out home.

Even closer to the Fritzl "readymade" is Harald Persson's Nedgrävning (Burial). This was the name given to an art project carried out in November 1994. The Swedish artist dug a hole in Picasso Park in Halmstad and buried a white, one metre cubed block of concrete. This event was largely forgotten, until a couple of years ago when it was included in an art guide to the town. Tourists can now visit the site... and see nothing at all. This is probably exactly what happens at the now-vanished 25 Cromwell Street in Gloucester and the sealed-up cellar of the Fritzl house in Amstetten.
_________

(1) This raises some vexing questions. Is it possible to distinguish between "good" and "bad" dark tourism? What is the "wrong" sort of dark tourist or the "wrong" sort of "black spot"? Or is appropriateness determined by the motivations of the visitor and the nature of the interpretation? If so, can anything become a visitor attraction?

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References

AP (2011) "Josef Fritzl basement to be filled with concrete", Associated Press, 12/08, accessed 26/08/2011 at,
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/12/fritzl-basement-filled-concrete
Engen, Øyvind Bosnes (2011) "Falsk historie om 1814", Romerikes Blad, 18/05, accessed 26/08/2011 at,
    http://www.rb.no/lokal_kultur/article5611181.ece
Lingwood, James (ed.) (1995) House, London: Phaidon
Moyes, Jojo (1996) "Fred West house to be demolished", Independent, 05/10, accessed 26/08/2011 at,
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/fred-west-house-to-be-demolished-1356745.html
Persson, Harald (1994/2011) Nedgrävning. Fotografisk documentation (photographs by Joacim Bengtsson), Stockholm
Rojek, Chris (1999) "Fatal Attractions" in Boswell, D. and Evans, J. (eds.) Representing the Nation:
    Histories, Heritage and Museums, London: Routledge, pp. 185-207
Seaton, A.V. (1996) "Guided by the dark: from thanatopsis to thanatourism", International Journal of Heritage Studies,
    Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. 234-244
Stanton Scott (2003) The Tombstone Tourist: Musicians, New York: Pocket Books

Author
an extinct parasite
of several hosts
Why parasite?

Para, jämsides med.
En annan sort.
Dénis Lindbohm,
Bevingaren, 1980: 90

Even a parasite like me should be permitted to feed at the banquet of knowledge

I once posted comments as Bevingaren at guardian.co.uk