Haggerston - Behind closed doors...

On the 1st March 2015, I visited Haggerston for the first time, in order to embrace the supposed spontaneity of immersive theatre with a friend.  Unlike other areas, I have visited as part of the L.O.P., the area left me slightly underwhelmed.  But as I have long since determined, it's not the place that failed to reveal its treasures to me but the fact that I was not receptive to the details that are always there.  There is normally something to be gained by simply being in the moment but the moment I was in had past.  I was in a strange mood.

In order to waste time until it was time to enter the venue where the immersive theatre production was due to take place, I wandered around and as I regularly experience, I discovered a green space.  This offered a sense of respite from the strangeness of Haggerston with its long streets and seemingly never ending building merchants.  Stonebridge Gardens was located just behind the Haggerston Overground Station.

Something about trees.  Gnarled and knotted yet alive.

Strange markings on the ground, almost a secret landing site for UFOs.  Well, really markings on a football pitch, but I prefer my version.

Goalposts fascinate me.  I think it's the lines and the bent frames created from years of play.

Goalpost in Stonebridge Gardens looking towards the church in the distance.

I don't understand why but I am still fascinated by churches.  They seem to represent a demarcation point between some point in my past and the future.  My current agnosticism may explain the love of religious iconography or simply the ornate architecture.  I only looked at the church from a distance but that offered some degree of solace.

Something peculiar about the juxtaposition of nature and the church in the background.  The tree seems to remind me of a particularly nasty insect.  The cross a force for good, however innocuous it seems at first sight.

All Saint's Church in Haggerston.

Sign for All Saint's Church, promising that 'All are welcome'.

I left Stonebridge Gardens and walked around the area heading to the King's Head Members Club on Kingsland Road where the 'Secret Theatre' were soon to be performing.  It was an old pub, tatty on the outside and a codeword was required to gain entry but still too early, so I continued to walk.  I realised how close Hoxton was.  I saw Regent's Canal in the distance but I was not in the mood to head towards water (in direct opposition to my usual urge).  I was particularly taken by a tattoo parlour.  Something about the darkness and potential for creativity.

Tattoo parlour's sign.

Seeing a chair like this always reminds me of Sweeney Todd.  Barred windows.  More crosses.

Returning for the last time to the King's Head Members Club, I saw some brilliant street art on the side of the old pub and the little courtyard adjacent to it.

A meeting of great minds?

Sometimes, I wonder whether the meanings conveyed in these images are of more cultural significance than a year's worth of inane television programmes?

Woman in a bottle marked Dork.

This image reminded me of the comic, 'Black Hole'.  I love the idea of melting people.  A waxen union.

Pressing the buzzer and finally being admitted to the King's Head Members Club once the password was given, we were led into the bar area.  Stuffed animals scattered around and a decor reminding me of the twisted imperialist dreams of the early colonialists.  My friend arrived, we talked and we were accosted by the staff of this exclusive establishment, explaining how outside of performances it was a private members club, we might like to join.  No secret handshakes or symbolic exchanges just a simple momentary transaction to join this establishment.  We put on our masks.  The performance began with a blood drenched guy explaining how he had been told to do it.  We were then privy to a performance piece that borrowed liberally from 'Seven' as we were led around the venue and saw people in various states of life, as the representatives of law and order, desperately tried to find the culprit.  A theological morality play without the content.  The building and its peculiar contents such as a stuffed polar bear either real or a copy were the highlights of the piece.  I half remember a cross hanging from the mouth of the polar bear.  Some days, you have to step back and realise that the point of the experience can simply be the repetition of an image.  It doesn't have to be anything more profound than that.

I left the venue with my friend and said my goodbye to Haggerston.  There is possibly more to experience there but not yet.

The Haggerston Overground sign.

                                             Barry Watt - 14th March 2015.

Afterword.

Secret Theatre are a theatre group that seem to have the right motives.  I just wish that the production had been more original.  Please see the link before for more information about them.

http://www.secrettheatrelondon.com/about.html

The King's Head Members Club is located in Kingsland Road and here's their website if you wish to become a member:

http://www.thekingshead-london.com/

Sweeney Todd, the so-called 'Demon Barber of Fleet Street'.  Possibly an urban legend, although anyone with any interest in London and its past will have bumped into him in the darker recesses of libraries and repeatedly throughout popular culture.

'Black Hole' was written by Charles Burns and is published as a hardcover graphic novel by Jonathan Cape in the UK.  It's a beautiful exploration of the horrific repercussions of the spread of a sexual infection that causes transformations.  It also explores the experiences of being a teenager in the 70s.

'Seven' was a very successful psychological film released in 1995.  Clearly, a great influence on the Secret Theatre performance.  It has one of the most memorable endings from any film released in the last thirty years.  Currently available on DVD and Blu Ray from Warner Home Video.

                                                                                                                               BW.

     

 

Whitechapel - Of Boxes, Squares and Blood.

Today, as a shadowy male or female figure once did, I stalked the streets of Whitechapel (slightly).  I avoided visiting the sites associated with Jack the Ripper, although s/he pervades the streets of East London.  A spectral vulture feeding on the culture of the area, spewing forth ideas and indirectly giving a name to a hairdressers, Jack the Clipper!

I began my journeys at the Whitechapel Gallery, where I attended the 'Adventures of the Black Square' exhibition.  This exhibition featured numerous works including one of Malevich's 'Black Quadrilateral' paintings, which helped to kick start a branch of abstract act, concerned with depicting the world through shapes, particularly squares and also lines.  The exhibition  ranged from 1915 to the present day and contained an eclectic mix of works.  My mind oddly not engaging with lots of the works.  Although, occasionally, I found myself responding in slightly interesting ways to compositions and installations.  One video installation involved coloured blocks moving across the foreground of the screen in different directions and the background contained various details of everyday life.  I remained entranced until I could finally determine whether the blocks would merge or crash with each other.  The blocks overlapped.  I was glad they did not crash.  I worried about the damage such a collision would cause to their integral form.

I found the Whitechapel Gallery a fascinating space.  Some of the galleries in the space were like large warehouse spaces.  Brick walls punctuated by screens representing more spaces.  Environments captured via the means of photography and rapidly cut between.  In fact, the building as a whole struck me as being no more coherent than a series of jigsaw pieces thrown in the air and allowed to fall as they chose.  Not a bad thing when you get used to visiting galleries that are clinically organised.  One particular series of works were presented in a room which had variable lighting.  I was amazed to see a member of staff sitting in the room, whilst music played.  To sit in what must feel like a meditative state for any length of time, having the tranquillity or madness interrupted by visitors must be difficult.

 

Cupids guard the Whitechapel Gallery.

 

 

Well, free up to a point unless you visit the paid exhibitions.

 

 

I left the Whitechapel Gallery and went for a little walk around the area.  For some reason, I found myself immediately drawn to a park.  I entered the park and was amazed to see lots of bits of flooring and bizarre relics.  I was reminded of alters (as it turns out rightly so).

 

 

 

The entrance to Altab Ali Park, originally known as St. Mary's Park.  It was renamed to remember a man who was murdered in Adler Street in 1978.

 

 

Altab Ali Park contains the remains of St. Mary Matfelon, a 14th Century white chapel and I believe other churches that have been build on the site through the centuries.  So by accident, I stumbled on the origins of Whitechapel.  It certainly feels like an area of positive energies in its current manifestation, a place of rest and unity.

 

 

 

Lovely mosaic tiles, in conjunction with nature.

 

An adult playground for spiritualists and pacifists.

 

If anyone can explain the meaning of this diagram, I would be very grateful for an interpretation.  It looks like a map or an attempt to illustrate the positioning of celestial bodies.

 

After leaving the park, I continued my journey around Whitechapel and its vicinities.  I was determined to visit Fournier Street (strictly speaking not Whitechapel but as I have discovered, it is hard to ascertain where one section of East London starts and another ends).  Fournier Street located in Spitalfields still contains a number of 18th Century houses.  It's like walking into a Dickens' novel, only dirtier and weirder.  Prior to entering the street, I was accosted by a cyclist who scrounged money from me to get a taxi to go to Homerton Hospital.  He had a huge gash on his arm.  Real or fake to encourage gullible people to part with their cash?  Doesn't matter, I need some positive karma.

 

 

Fournier Street.  The trend for replacement continues apace but not removal.  The original sign (or one of them hides beneath the pretender to modernity.

 

Fournier Street.  A picture postcard of a past still clung to with reverence.

 

Creative window display in Fournier Street.

 

Whilst in Whitechapel, I was impressed by the eclectic range of eateries adorning the roads and even more so by the street art and other creative endeavours including the protest posters.

 

 

 

Just struck me as striking. 

 

I guess it's a poster advertising an artist's work but as is the case in East London, things like this crop up all over the place.  Grotty building sites are home to unique art.

 

I was interested in this with its reference to 'aggressive marketing strategies'.  I believe it may be connected to the above artist or group, although this has been torn creating a new work of art.

 

An Anarchist group expressing their solidarity with their captured colleagues in Spain.  I was attracted by its style and the image of the bird and the flowers.  The roots surrounding the Anarchist's logo also seem strangely out of time.

 

Whilst I headed back to Whitechapel Station, I took photos of objects and shapes that interested me.  I feel that capturing a sense of space is as much about exploring those things that have an emotional impact upon you as taking photos of local attractions.

 

 

Chimney, possibly part of the Royal London Hospital.  This reminded me of the Serpent from the Garden of Eden for some reason, possibly wrapped around the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

 

Closer image of the Serpent and Tree.

 

One of the buildings that form the Royal London Hospital.  This reminded me of Mondrian's paintings.

 

Another photo of the Royal London Hospital.  I was entranced by the plastic flurries and barbed wire.  A more accurate summation of life in the 21st Century I couldn't possibly hope to find.

 

Just a local Angel looking for a place to stay.

 

The clue is in the name.

 

I finished my journey at the Whitechapel Overground Station (as if you recall, that's what the L.O.P. is all about.  There was an amusing moment when I looked up and saw both the Underground and Overground signs, but you may have to sing the two words to understand my reference.

 

The Whitechapel Overground sign.

 

                                                                 Barry Watt - 7th February 2015.

 

Afterword

Highbury and Islington - The wealth, the passion and the branding.

I confess I did not take my camera with me, so managed to miss some quite visually stunning sights.  The sky as it faded into a patchy red sunset and an interesting piece of Banksy style graffiti (It was of a black angel and on the side of a shop).  Nonetheless, I was there and it was a splendid and revealing evening.

Coming out of Highbury and Islington Station is similar to descending onto an affluent alien terrain.  Yet, Upper Street in Islington still suffers from the horrors of modern life i.e. Starbucks, the restaurant with the Golden Arches and more mobile phone shops than you can salute with two fingers.  Then if you walk down towards Angel, you are overwhelmed by the range of card shops that scatter the environment inviting you in to buy post ironic commentaries on the modern art scene and upon a life lived inside a sweet wrapper.  Wonka's 'Golden Ticket' is up for grabs for everyone around this neck of the woods and the rose tinted glasses are blinding.  There is a problem with homelessness in this area but that is offered as an observation, not as a judgement.  It is a London problem overlooked in the miasma of Boris Bikes and royal babies.

Whilst walking down Upper Street on my journey to the Hilton Islington, I felt caught up as though in a Bret Easton Ellis novel.  Wealthy people happily engaging in their Friday night frolics.  Sojourns into restaurants with minimalist names.  I wouldn't have been surprised if one had simply been called 'Yes: The Restaurant You Want'.  There was in fact a restaurant called 'The Fish and Chip Shop'.  I was left wondering what sort of food they offered?  I think my favourite eatery was called 'Snog'.  Basically, it appeared to be an ice cream parlour where everybody sat on upended toilets.  Actually, having done a little bit of research, they sell frozen yoghurt.  How silly of me to think that ice cream would be served these days in London outside of a Haagen Dazs or Ben and Jerrys?

Anyhow, Islington has the Almeida Theatre and the Union Chapel.  Both of which are worth visiting.  Indeed, the reason why I found myself in the foyer of the Hilton Islington at 9pm on a Friday night was thanks to the Almeida Theatre.  As is the case with many so-called 'fringe' theatres at this time of year, the Almeida Theatre puts on a festival.  Normally, short performance pieces or works in progress.  Last night's event was 'I Do', a site specific event wonderfully created to maximise the impact of six unique rooms and a corridor.  As the audience arrived, we exchanged our tickets for flowers.  We got to choose our flowers.  I opted for a dark purple pinhole, which went with my eyes after a day at work.  There were six groups and six guides, who could be recognised by their matching flowers.  At 9.15 pm promptly, we were led to the third floor after being instructed as to the appropriate protocol within a functioning hotel.  Also intriguingly, we were advised to walk close to the walls, in case people passed us.  Each group was taken into a different room and through the six separate 'scenes' as I will call them then led out into the corridor where a member of cast dressed as a cleaner repeated her backward progression down the corridor and then out of site as music played backwards.  Essentially, the play was comprised of the six interrelated scenes that when slotted together formed a complete story.  Each scene being set fifteen minutes before a couple get married.  The scenes were small intimate pieces.  Some were funny and the audience had the dubious pleasure of being acted around and indeed, occasionally pushed out of the way.  At one point, as the Bride and Bridesmaids got ready, I ended up temporarily shut in a bedroom!  Without giving too much away, think last minute doubts, newly discovered bisexuality and troubled familial relationships and you get a sense of the narrative and its development.

Now the production itself was wonderful because it emphasised a point that seems to be overlooked by some producers of 'immersive theatre', that you do need a plot or structure to anchor the audience.  The visual aspects of a production are of course, important but in order to remain memorable and to hold the attention of the audience, you need something that engages their soul and intellect.  I need to feel what I experience.  Using the hotel, the theatre company, Dante or Die could use bathroom mirrors to show a Best Man giving his speech.  Also some of the rooms were intimate enough to portray highly emotional scenes.  A man in a wheelchair (I believe the Groom's father) and a woman (probably the Groom's mother) trying to get him ready for the wedding.  The woman revealing her love for this man, paradoxically tied to an inherent frustration with the endless daily rituals performed as she is forced to be both a wife and carer. 

'I Do' was brilliant and the Hilton Islington is on my list of places to stay if I ever become a millionaire.  I want it made clear that as I left the hotel and indeed, the station, I like Highbury and Islington.  Yes, it suffers from the current need for redevelopment sucking the history out of everything and rendering everything the same.  Yet somewhere amongst the hatchet job, there remains a vibrant community with its own identity like Stoke Newington and Camden.  Just ease up on the standard high street stores and lay off on the pretension.

Barry Watt - 3rd August 2013

Afterword

Haagen Dazs, Starbucks and 'the Golden Arches' are all copyright to their respective holders.

Willy Wonka and the 'Golden Ticket' appear in 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' by Roald Dahl, one of the best children's books ever written.  Currently available from Puffin Books.

Snog have a website and I will visit it properly to sample their wares in the future.

http://www.ifancyasnog.com/

'I Do' is copyright to Dante or Die and finishes tonight although, I believe it has toured.  They have a website too.

http://www.danteordie.com/

Also the Almeida Theatre, if you want to try theatre that is more varied than the usual West End model of here's another Chekhov or Ibsen!  (Not that I mind either of those two playwrights).

http://www.almeida.co.uk/

The Hilton Hotel has a website too but that won't surprise anyone.  Here's the link to the Hilton Islington where you too can cry at the prices!

http://www3.hilton.com/en/hotels/united-kingdom/hilton-london-islington-hotel-LONISHN/offers/100048084.htm?WT.mc_id=zMWGBAA0UK1WW2PSH3SearchEngines4GrGetawayXIII5EN7GW841547&WT.srch=1



                                                                                                                 BW



 

Kew Gardens - Beauty through nurturing hands.

Okay, firstly, another much delayed blog entry.  The L.O.P. seems to be the never-ending project but I guess, so long as I accept that, I can still have fun seeing where it takes me (and others).

Today, I cheated...  Not through choice but through some kind of happening that effectively cancelled several services on the London Overground.  I was going to use the Overground to get home from Kew Gardens, so thus fulfilling my intention of using the line to justify the project.  But let's face it, the L.O.P. is actually more about discovering London and its environs plus I did get to visit Kew Gardens' Overground station (the same as the Underground station).  The Overground platform is also the platform for the District Line.

Enough with the dull as dishwater explanation and on with the nice empowering embrace of Nature...

I attended Kew Gardens at just after 9.30 am.  I anticipated that my visit there would be quite long and the weather being remarkably hot, I decided that by arriving early, my exit could be achieved before the joys of char grilled Barry (it's currently 4.41 pm and my skin is feeling tight and hot but not burnt).

My first impression of Kew Gardens concerned its size.  Upon entering, I was given a map which I consulted then put in my pocket for awhile.  It's always best to explore then consult the map when the paths least travelled fail to manifest themselves or alternatively, you get lost walking round and round seeking the Bonsais (yes, I did!)

The first thing that really grabbed my attention other than the toilets but that's a given,  (Unusually, these toilets had a glass ceiling, so birds, insects and other animals could watch whilst you peed.  An image that is oddly comforting until you realise that birds see colours different to us, so parts of the human anatomy probably look really weird to them), was the Temple of Arethusa with a plaque that had been constructed to commemorate those members of staff who had died in the two World Wars.

The Temple of Arethusa.  Peaceful and oddly invisible.

 

 

The Temple of Arethusa was near to Kew Garden's entrance and one of the shopping areas, so it sadly seemed a hidden treasure overlooked by the many visitors eager to stock up on Kew merchandise.

 

My walk around was initially aimless.  My only vague goal was at some point to see Kew Palace.  Let's get that out of the way now, although it took me awhile to find it.  I was quite underwhelmed with Kew Palace.  In comparison with Hampton Court, it lacks something.  A certain sense of majesty and splendour.  It's actually quite understated and pales into insignificance when compared with the Gardens.

 

Kew Palace.  Oddly obsolete.  History relegated to a minor background detail.





The interior of Kew Palace is occupied by attendants dressed in period dress, either looking very happy to see you or feeling ridiculous and counting the hours until lunch.  It's peculiar how little of the interior of the Palace I recall.  I do remember the quotes scattered around indicating that this lifeless shell was once a place of life.  Bed chambers merely hinting at bodily exertions and the exchange of fluids.  The portraits on the wall depicted wealthy individuals with bushy eyebrows and beards.  Both symbolising overbearing masculinity in men and women.

Back to my wanderings outside...  At the moment, Kew Gardens has quite an interesting program of events and novelties under the innovative title of 'INCREDIBLES' (Split the word in two and you get the idea, the focus is on edible plants etc.  One of the first sights that caught my eye was a table lined up with plates.  It felt like something out of a novel.

The table that reminds us of our eating habits.

The answer to the riddle posed below.

The riddle.  Clue...  It's yellow and you wouldn't want to rub it on your chest.

 

 

All of the plates had these little riddles on them relating to edible plants and foods/sauces relating to said plants.  I spent at least, thirty seconds pondering the riddles then experiencing the sensation of the sun's rays, I quickly disappeared into one of the many green houses that are scattered around Kew Gardens.

 

One of the many wonderful devices seeking to help to create a love of horticulture in children is this giant ruler, demonstrating the growth rate of the Giant Bamboo.  One point I must emphasise is how hot the greenhouses were.  Some of them also had the addition of sprinkler systems, so not only did you boil alive under glass but you were also sprinkled with hot water.  A small price to pay when you are appreciating the beauty of Nature.

Throughout the Gardens, I was mesmerised by the vast array of flowers, insects, animals, fish and birds I encountered.  I took over three hundred photos (I know but I like flowers etc), so here's a small assortment of them for your pleasure and delectation.

Lovely bird.  A little peeved at the photographer.

 

Purple flower.

 

Sunflower.

 

So Koi!

 

Bee.

 

New Romantic Squirrel.

 

Curious Jellyfish style flower.

 

The Peacock had a limp that generated a lot of conversation and I felt a great deal of sympathy for her/him as s/he hopped around avoiding the visitors.

 

 

To end this account, I will offer four more photos.   One photo is of a Devilish figure that oversaw part of the Gardens, one is of the Gardens' statutory rights (including the fact that you can't use any of the plants etc in artistic works.  So you can copyright Nature can you?) and also two photos pertaining to the London Overground and the fact that I actually nearly got to travel on the Overground from Kew Gardens' station...  Today was a day of many highs.  Kew Gardens is literally like the Garden of Eden without the pesky snakes.  Nudity should be actively encouraged, although I am sure it is prohibited by the Regulations.  Also without clothes, human beings look universally funny to birds.

 

 

Strange Devilish figure.

 

Statutory Regulations.  The usual list of dos and don'ts.  At best, leave the animals, birds etc alone.  At worst, your photos potentially belong to us.

 

Well, I got there in the end.  Another station to cross off the L.O.P.

 

Part of the route I would have taken.  Promise!  ;-)

 

Barry Watt - 13th July 2013.

 

Afterthought

 

As it is the summer, everything seems to have a sexual dimension to it.  I offer one more flower as the final indication of how much a day out can corrupt me!

 

Provocative Nature.

 

                                                                      BW