Tearing the city at the seams #5 - A Farewell to Brutalism

You might ask why, on a day off work, I would choose to walk out to Elephant & Castle and explore around the Heygate estate; a notorious example of the crime-ridden council ghettos that dominated Britain’s inner cities during the 50s and 60s.  The answer is twofold:  firstly, that I find myself imbued with a strange and quite nihilistic fascination with such abandoned structures of decaying high-rise living, like physical embodiments of a dystopian imagination.  And secondly, they are currently due to be demolished by Southwark council, and redeveloped within the next 3 or 4 years, presumably shiny and repackaged as ‘luxury apartments’, with all the failings of the past firmly eradicated.

The estate is perhaps the most recognisable encapsulation (although some would argue the case for Sheffield’s Park Hill or Glasgow’s Red Road estate) of the brutalist architecture and urban ideals of its day, and hence why I felt a visit was so important before they cease to exist.  The central London location means that it has been immortalised in film and TV countless times, thereby confirming its place in the public consciousness as the instantly recognisable stage set backdrop to urban decay.

The estate was designed by Tim Tinker and completed in 1974.  An interesting detail in itself since high-rise developments had been prolific as a result of the post-war demand for community housing, and developers would have, by this time, been well aware of the negative side-effects of such structures from their observations, but nonetheless decided to go ahead; almost clinging to the schewed logic of an already failed optimism.  The estate embodies all the high-minded ideals of the brutalist movement, inspired by radical architects like Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe.  Their vision was that these ‘cities in the sky’ would inspire a sense of community spirit and collectivism, with open spaces between high-rises to be filled with greenery and vibrant interactivity.  Inevitably though, these estates quickly became incendiary devices for anti-social behaviour, drug abuse, graffiti and violence.

Wandering around the abandoned estate was an oddly disorienting experience.  The sound of heavy traffic from the neighbouring Elephant & Castle roundabout had faded into the background hum of an air-conditioning unit, and with its cracked concrete walls, smashed windows and overgrown bracken, it felt as though I was walking around an old East German communist bloc, stripped of all occupants and left as a vacant relic.  The ground-floor garages were shuttered and locked, resembling a desolate high-street with its recession-hit shops, the embodiment of a model out-stripped by the pace of development.  Glancing up at the shear face of the walls, a flock of satellite dishes still perched from the window ledges like sedentary birds.

The harsh concrete edges, the reliance on the unwavering straight lines and rectilinear geometries, the raised walkways and stairwells all following the same sharp angular style with no room for compromise, struck me as deeply redolent of both the high-modernist ambition of this new ideal for living juxtaposing with the subsequent decline into degradation and failure.  The estate is bordered by four hulking fortress-like apartment buildings that have the effect of closing the estate in on itself, like an inverse gated community that instead of heightening security, actually served as a breeding ground for insecurity and anxiety.

One could be forgiven for experiencing a sense of bewilderment at how anyone – architects, urban planners or inhabitants – could have, at one time, held the view that an estate following such a design could in any way foster enhanced social harmony and cohesion.  But perhaps I’m being overly lavish with the lucre of hindsight, as indeed many residents claim that at the time they were enthused with their new homes and many have in fact campaigned vehemently against its demolition.  Often blamed for the estate’s swift decline is the local council and government’s relaxation of the entry requirements for prospective new tenants, thereby disfavouring more stable long-term inhabitants.

As I wandered around the borderline of the new estate I pondered this point but also the notion that such estates are indeed condemned to extinction as a failed social experiment because their very aesthetics represent all the things we have come to assimilate with urban decay.  Neighbouring the estate, a bloom of new apartment buildings stand almost wilting in their modernist apparel.  They incorporate the jagged, curvaceous designs and playful external cladding that in my view have become just as much a blight on our contemporary urban environment.

In fact, so ostentatiously psychedelic is one particular block’s finement that you have to wonder whether this has been purposefully manufactured by designers as atonement in some way for the grey concrete tedium of their predecessors.  Out on Walworth Street one apartment build incorporates small room-extensions that jut out from the main shell, appearing to overhang the pavement and teeming traffic.  I feel similarly baffled that designers could view such a vertiginously intrusive feature conducive to good living, unless of course those rooms house the toilet facilities thereby converging with the floor-to-ceiling windows to offer inhabitants the bizarre thrill of appearing to excrete down onto pedestrians below.  Neo-medievalism if you like!

You only have to observe these utterly mundane buildings, with their soft edges and shiny streamlined facades steeped in their own homogeneity, as well as the Strata tower (with its mock wind turbines that often give the impression of a hairdryer coiffuring the cloudy wigs of the London skyline), to gain a sense of the sheer short-termism of these architectural phases.

Why exactly is it that common consensus is taken to be the wholesale rejection of these estates simply because they no longer conform with the stylistic fashions of the day?  Do they need to be entirely eradicated, thereby condemning a legitimate period of British architectural history to the annals of recorded memory, or could they instead be gusseyed up with a smattering of shiny steel and glass or more attractive external cladding like cosmetic surgery beautifying a plain face.

The reason I argue against their demolition is that I see worth in renovation and revitalisation rather than rejection and conforming to bland modernist type.  I wonder just how much of the negative mythology of such estates, manufactured largely by the media and enshrined by the creative arts, is to blame for their current demise, purely because to the public they represent the natural terrain for crime, disorder and everything fearful and loathesome about society.

My lasting assertion, walking around the cracked and spalled waste ground was that beneath the surface gloss and the warm exteriors, the collectivist living conditions of these modern apartment buildings can scarcely be any different, except that the psyche of the masses knows to reject it as being unfavourable.  Indeed I understand it is easy to romanticise the dystopian imagery and iconography these landscapes evoke – from the visuals of Kubrick’s ‘A Clockwork Orange’ to the sounds of Manchester’s acid house culture that germinated from Hulme Crescents – and one shouldn’t presume that I myself would be happy to live in such a place.

However, the architecture of the built environment is a structural smorgasbord of the ideals and ambitions of their time and is all the more interesting for it.  By reducing to dust buildings that have fallen from ideological and aesthetical favour, we do ourselves a disservice, and in my view such estates should undergo measures of compromise – the retaining of their ostensible architecture whilst being renovated with more populist modern tropes.  In so doing – and expending far less council resources - local residents might be able to continue their habitation without the propagation of new ‘luxury developments’ that exclude so many of them.  By resisting full-scale change based on short-term prejudices, our urban environments will be far more enlightening and diverse in the long-term.

Culture - January

Books Read:

Merlin Coverley - 'Psychogeography' (non-fiction)
Jonathan Swift - 'Gulliver's Travels'
Georges Bataille - 'Blue of Noon'
Lebbeus Woods - 'War and Architecture' (non-fiction)
Norman Mailer - 'An American Dream'
Paul Eltzbacher - 'Anarchism' (non-fiction)

I managed to wade through quite a large amount during January.  I hope I can keep it up throughout the year.  I particularly enjoyed reading Swift’s ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ for the first time; such a lacuna of ideas and inspiration, reading it you can sense the imaginations of later writers like HG Wells, Burgess, Ballard, Roald Dahl just firing off at all trajectories.  The late Lebbeus Woods’ pamphlet on ‘War & Architecture’ offered an intriguingly radical manifesto for how cities should be reconstructed following the destructive event of war.  One particular credo that really resonated with me was that we should aspire to, 'architecture drawn as though it were already built - architecture built as though it had never been drawn'.

Films Watched:

'Tommy' (Ken Russell)
'McCullin' (Jacqui & David Morris) (documentary) (at Curzon, Soho)
'McVicar' (Tom Clegg)
'The Grudge' (Takashi Shimizu)
'Django Unchained' (Quentin Tarantino) (at Ritzy Picturehouse, Brixton)
'Child's Play' (Tom Holland)
'Lincoln' (Steven Spielberg) (at Ritzy Picturehouse, Brixton)
'The Cabin in the Woods' (Drew Goddard)

The documentary feature ‘McCullin’, examining the remarkable life and career of war photographer Don McCullin, was an insightful and constantly fascinating exploration into his working methods and the scars that have inevitably wrought themselves onto his psyche through his experiences in Vietnam, Biafra and the Congo.  Some of the images shown were among the most harrowing you will see on screen, but it served as a stark and necessary reminder of the inherent cruelty in the world, as well as the moral duty we have to capture and face it.

I found ‘Django Unchained’ to be yet further proof (if any were needed) of Quentin Tarantino’s status as the premier onanistic auteur working in cinema today.  The first 90-minutes were rollickingly compelling with more than a few hints at his former brilliance, before it all-too-predictably became bogged-down in his own flabby self-indulgence.  The triple ensemble of Waltz, Foxx and DiCaprio gave laudatory performances, and the character of Samuel L. Jackson was audacious, but this didn’t stop the film ultimately being hindered by its own towering ego.

At the polar opposite of the spectrum in terms of handling the slave trade, Spielberg’s ‘Lincoln’ was captivating and thoroughly worth the investiture of concentration demanded.  The careful restraint Spielberg afforded the dramatic performances – in surely his least characteristic film to date – meant that emotions were never unduly manipulated or exploited; a charge often levelled at him by his detractors.  Daniel Day-Lewis’ performance was, perhaps unsurprisingly, a monumental achievement and he well deserves that third Oscar.  

Albums Played:

John Talobot - 'Fin'
David Bowie - 'Hunky Dory'
David Bowie - 'Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders from Mars'
David Bowie - 'Aladdin Sane'
David Bowie - 'Pin-Ups'
David Bowie - 'Young Americans'
David Bowie - 'Station to Station'
David Bowie - 'Heroes'
David Bowie - 'Lodger'
David Bowie - 'Scary Monsters'
David Bowie - 'Tonight'
David Bowie - 'Never Let Me Down'
Eels - 'Wonderful, Glorious'
Four Tet - '0181'
Esben & the Witch - 'Wash The Sins Not Only The Face'

Following the exciting revelation that ultra-reclusive David Bowie would be releasing a comeback album, I began working my way through his gem-encrusted oeuvre, refreshing myself on those familiar classics and alighting upon those hitherto overlooked.  It is astonishing his level of creativity and sheer consistency (surely the only comparable musical artist is Bob Dylan); in the 70s he seemingly tossed-off albums with a weighty stature that most self-respecting bands never even get close to.  Indeed, charting the course of his career through genres as diverse as folk, glam rock, plastic soul, electronica, funk is endlessly rewarding.  Personally, I believe his zenith to be ‘Heroes’, although I was newly enamoured by early effort ‘Hunky Dory’ and latter-day 'Scary Monsters'.  However vibrant an individual’s genius and however plentiful the highs, there are always the inevitable lows; listening to his self-confessed late-80s nadir ‘Never Let Me Down’ it is possible to wrangle a slight perverse enjoyment out of the album if only by ruminating on how less than a decade earlier the same artist had been in the throes of his ‘Berlin Trilogy’.  Nevertheless, I look forward to continuing my Bowie odyssey into February.

Gigs Attended:

My Bloody Valentine (at Electric Brixton, London)

Tearing the city at the seams - city hike no.4

So with the gluttinous festivities of Christmas Day over I decided to uphold Boxing Day tradition and set off on an elaborate jaunt into the physical geography.  Surrely such a venture is just another Yuletide obligation; that of prising yourself up from the sedentary suction-cup of the sofa and heading out for a brisk stretching of the legs and fresh country air?  Perhaps it is a desperate kick back against the calorific splurge of the previous day, trying to maintain adequate bloodflow past the saturated fats and alcoholic toxins shoring up your veins and arteries.

Deprived of an abundance of geographical splendours, living in the man-made leviathan of London, I could feel myself being compelled towards the predictable climes of Hampstead Heath or Regent's Park, where I could foresee that everyone and their new dog would be out trying to stem the tide of their bulging waistlines.  Until I realised I had been overlooking the one truly great physical feature at my disposal, one surely overlooked by every Londoner each day due to its sheer ubiquity - the River Thames.

This cartographic creeper of blue tinsel draped across the branches of the city's bulk was the perfect setting for my next urban hike.  And so I set as my target, to walk from West to East crossing all 13 of the central London bridges on my way.  My zig-zag teetering on the borderline between north and south might perhaps provide me with a fresh appreciation of the ancient aquatic feature that acts as a pivot point for so much of our routine orientation.   We habitually judge places and locations in relation to the river, and, I think, unconsciously keep aware in our minds the fact that for all the changes that manifest themselves on the cityscape - buildings built and torn down - and however much the structures of own lives may change, the river will remain resolutely the same, flowing along with the passing of time.

I began my trek crossing from north to south over the Battersea Bridge with the boats moored along Chelsea Harbour like bobbing ducks.  Straight away I could sense a tangible shift in my ordinance of the city environs, viewing as I was an unfamiliar south-westerly perspective.  My usual compass nodes of reference - the London Eye, the Shard, the new St. George's Wharf tower, Battersea Power Station - had shifted around like numbers on a melting clockface.  From there it was a short walk to Albert Bridge, with its odd whimsical white suspension frame, purple spokes and spires, like something out of a 'Sleeping Beauty' cartoon.  I noticed a sign displayed on both ends instructing 'All troops [to] break step when marching over', apparently because of it being used by 4 x 4 'Chelsea tractors' that were frequently breaching the weight limit, most likely for mum to ferry little Jack or Emily the half-mile to and from school.

I continued along the north ridge of Battersea Park, past the rather garish Chinese Peace Pagoda, until crossing north over the Chelsea Bridge, the first self-anchored suspension bridge in Britain.  Compared to the camp exhibitionism of Albert, this seemed almost frigid in its refinement, with its spare red-and-white chains.

Walking along the north-side Grosvenor Road, as it flanks the awe-inspiring Battersea Power Station, one cannot help but think that this must be one of the last remaining truly great monuments to the industrial age remaining in London, or perhaps even the UK.  The chimney pillors, as defiant as fisted arms held aloft, and the brick cathedral style (indeed it is the largest brick building in Europe) are a stirring reminder of our heritage and should, in my view, be painstakingly renovated into either exhibition space (i.e. the Tate Modern) or an entertainment venue (i.e. the Millenium Dome).  However, it will likely be the case that it will become spruced into another luxury apartment complex for decamping millionaires.  One can't help but notice the modernist abomination of such an apartment block neighbouring the power station with its glass frontage and blue and grey external cladding, it resembles the architecture of a child gifted a set of colourful plastic building blocks.  Indeed that seems to be the inevitable destiny for the whole of the south side Nine Elms industrial stretch of the river leading towards Vauxhall, being as it is surely prime real estate for a committed consortia of developers.

Crossing south over the Vauxhall Bridge, looking eastwards the sharp curving sweep of the river had already eradicated from view the distance I had so far undergone.  Indication of the form the bankside redevelopment will take can be evidenced from the migraine-inducingly modern St. George's Wharf complex, with its verticalised glass Havana cigar and surrounding Emerald City-like greenhouses topped with their individual V-shaped roofs like childish drawings of birds-in-flight rendered in structural form.

Directly opposite across Vauxhall Bridge is MI6, a perfect example of a building who's exterior design represents its internal utility.  For just a quick glance at its sharp oblong blocks and Mayan-temple form stirs up images of labyrinthine secret passageways, corridors that lead nowhere, and hidden entranceways like a sort of Kafka-esque monument to bureaucratic secrecy and espionage.  I continued along the Albert Embankment and across Lambeth Bridge, flanked by two pillars topped curiously by stone acorns, before pausing to eat my leftover turkey sandwiches in the Westminster Palace Gardens.

I ruminated on the notion of how it had transpired that each of these bridges had been planned and designated for their current positions.  It seems to me that the choosing to construct a bridge linking, say, Battersea with Chelsea or Vauxhall with Pimlico, must be a product of a substantial quantity of minds clashing and meeting, compromises settled and arguments bandied back and forth about the justification or logic for the hand-holding of two separate – and quite often distinctly different – provinces of the city.  Why these precise locations over any others, and what were the personal/political agendas invariably simmering in the background in the minds of those architects and city planners?

Continuing my walk I crossed Westminster Bridge to the South Bank and squeezed my way through perhaps the most oppressive of London’s tourist enclaves – the stretch running past the County Hall building which is now an insipid amalgamation of a McDonalds, various amusement arcades and the London Aquarium.  After a brief hop northwards over the double-suspension Hungerford Bridge, I lurched back onto the South Bank across easily my favourite, Waterloo Bridge.  This is probably my choice viewpoint of the entire city.  It is the particular angle of the bridge, positioned at the apex point of the curving river, that affords it an unparalleled panoramic stretch to both the east and west.  I like to think it represents a salient pendulum between the dual powers, Parliament on the one side and the economic City heartland on the other; both beacons of influence, however lamented at times, between which the rest of the country perpetually oscillates.

It was my first time crossing the inconspicuous Blackfriars Bridge and by this time the driving rain was beginning to ferment a sense of urgency to my journey.  I did however, pause to wonder at some mysterious grafitti daubed on one of the stone alcoves along the bridge - 'The boy set fire to himself'.  What could this signify I wondered?  Was it a factual statement recorded by a witness to this young vagrant's self-immolation? Or perhaps a naive plea of defence on behalf of some pyromaniac fugitive?  I simply don't know, although there was certainly no danger of anyone burning to death right now, such was the insistance of the rainfall.

I headed southwards again across the newest Millenium (or 'Wobbly') Bridge, now synonymous with London due to its magnificently photogenic views leading up to either the Tate Modern or St. Pauls.  The following two bridges, Southwark and London Bridge, I crossed with little or no interest, such is their uniform arch style.  In a way their dull and uninspiring form was a structural reflection of my own wearying sense of purpose as I drew close to the end of my journey.  As I crossed over London Bridge towards the gleaming incisor that is the Shard, I was reminded of how, when travelling in America, my expedition party had stopped off at Lake Havasu City in the Arizona desert for a look at the 19th century version of London Bridge which had been bought an shipped by Robert McCulloch, a millionaire oil tycoon.  Legend has it that he thought the Greater London Council were selling him Tower Bridge, and one can't help but laugh when imagining him slowly realising his mistake as the construction team drew closer to their completion.  As jolting and out-of-place the brick-stone bridge looked beneath a sweltering desert sun, it looks perfectly at home here in the grey and dour downpour of British wintertime.

Walking south along Potter's Field and the Mayor's office building, one would be forgiven for thinking that, on the north bank, the Tower of London looked similarly misplaced, overshadowed as it is now by the modernist spectacles of the Gherkin, the Heron Tower and the new Cheesegrater that clamber up behind it. 

I completed my hike by crossed the 13th and final Tower Bridge.  As I stood on the drawbridge, feet on either side of the dividing line, I reflected on my walk over the 3-and-a-half hours and how invigorating it had been to toe the equator line separating the two hemispheres of London.  In the past when I've visited the city very briefly and not actually set eyes on the river, it never feels like I've been there at all, such is the dominance the character of the river has on the unconscious orientational psyche of those who live here.  As much as the city banking the river may alter, for better or worse, the steady flow transcends time, continuing to be traversed across, oriented around and sorely overlooked by the populace.

Culture - December

Books read:

Mikhail Bulgakov - 'The Master and Margarita'
R.D. Laing - 'The Politics of Experience' (non-fiction)
Henry James - 'The Turn of the Screw'
Will Self - 'Feeding Frenzy' (non-fiction)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau - 'The Social Contract' (non-fiction)

Films Watched:

'Snowtown' (Justin Kurzel)
'Gremlins' (Joe Dante)
'Mean Girls' (Mark Waters)
'Its a Wonderful Life' (Frank Capra)
'The Bodyguard' (Mick Jackson)

Exhibitions:

'William S Burroughs- All out of time and into space' (at October Gallery, Holborn)

Theatre:

Complicite - 'The Master and Margarita' (at Barbican Theatre, London)

Top films of 2012

The move to London precipitated an increase in my cinema-going during 2012.  Being a local of the charming Brixton Ritzy Picturehouse, I feel compelled to try and experience even more of the filmic output in 2013.  Omitted from this round-up are the re-releases I was fortunate enough to see over the year which included classics such as 'Eraserhead', 'Jaws', '2001', and 'The Shining'.

5.  'Led Zeppelin - Celebration Day' (Dir. Dick Carruthers)
Shouldn't really qualify, falling as it does in the ambiguous sub-genre of musical concert film, but regardless of this, it was one of the most enjoyable cinema experiences of the year.  Disorienting as it was watching such an exhilarating concert in a darkened cinema screening, the production and direction perfectly captured both the bombastic spectacle and the intricate nuances of the individual performances that are inevitably lost in so vast an arena as the O2.

4.  'Argo' (Dir. Ben Affleck)
With little-to-no pre-existing knowledge of the true life events regarding the mission to smuggle embassy hostages out of 1970's Iran, I found 'Argo' both a gripping and entertaining thriller.  Affleck has certainly demonstrated his worth as a director and his admirable fondness for 70s-era movies (think 'All the President's Men', 'Marathon Man', etc), mimicked here with the gritty tone and texture of the film stock, even going so far in its homaging intentions as adopting the out-dated Warner Brothers logo.  Whilst the film understandably spirals into a more generic Hollywood climax, it didn't devalue it's potential for suspense with a very well-handled final set piece.

3.  'Skyfall'. (Dir. Sam Mendes)
After the utterly forgettable 'Quantum of Solace', Daniel Craig's third outing as James Bond deserves all the hyperbole and accolades that have been accorded it.  Despite the hype, in my view it is far from perfect - the idea of it being qualitatively comparable to the 2 best Bond films 'Goldfinger' and
'You Only Live Twice' is disingenuous.  This modern humanistic Bond (in this ultra-personalised  society we even require our superspy's to be lumbered withs emotional foibles) is such a different 
animal from that of Connery or Moore that it is surely useless to try and compare them.  Reassuring 
though it is to see Bond achieve a Lazurus-style comeback in the era of Bourne and Batman, the 
producers face an undesirable task of maintaining the high before surely the inevitable plummet into 
the mire of 'Die Another Day' territory.

2.  'Take This Waltz' (Dir. Sarah Polley)
The purest cinema experiences are the ones you embark on with minimal expectations or awareness
of the presentation.  So it was with this charming and engrossing portrait of dramatic realism from
Sarah Polley, about a young married couple veering into the barriers upon the arrival to their
neighbourhood of an attractive and mysterious stranger.  On paper, the familiarity of the storyline is
undeniable, yet the intricacies of the script and a stunning performance from Michelle Williams, push this film onto a higher plateau with some genuinely affecting set pieces and a number of jolting plot
developments that brilliantly dislodge the film from any potential predictability.

1.  'Shame' (Dir. Steve McQueen)
Steve McQueen's second film from January was easily the most powerful new film I saw in 2012.  A harsh, uncompromising representation of sex addiction, it tackled the subject matter in a head-on and frank manner free from distraction or unnecessary stylisation.  Michael Fassbender gives an incredible performance - surely he must be close to being his generation's De Niro? - as the man teetering on the brink of self-control and collapse into despair, a situation mirrored by his emotionally fragile sister, played by the only slightly impressive Carey Mulligan.

'Shame' is the kind of film that makes me proud to be a cineaste; a reassurance as to the capacity of film - often existing in the overlooked slipstream of franchises and remakes - to possess the hard-edged grip and composure to succeed in challenging an audience.

Tearing the city at the seams #3 - My journey to work

Coming from Brixton on either the #159 or the #3, it takes the us around 45 minutes on a smooth-flowing morning to stagger its way through South London and onwards to Oxford Circus.  The way the double-deckers lumber and lurch along the streets brings to mind a basking shark around which shoals of cyclist minnows daringly swirl and dart.

Although habitually immersed in a book during the journey, without fail I will pause upon reaching Westminster Bridge to gulp down the still surreal sight of Big Ben, Parliament, London Eye and the grey-brown Thames that unequivocally ground you in the physicality of London and continue to defy any blur of blasé.  The global icons that embody London are largely here in this short sprint of the bus across the bridge and the immediate panorama open to the eyes.  The cultural tourism route doesn’t dry up prematurely though; for the bus bends its way up Whitehall, past Downing Street, around Trafalgar Square, across Piccadilly Circus and the final furlong of Regent Street.  In terms of world-renowned symbols of a particular locality, this route must surely rank pretty high amidst everyday commutes that people embark on all around the country.

Like a voyager from the mothership I spring forth towards the top of Regent Street, directly opposite the aircraft hangar that is Apple’s flagship emporium of gadgetry.  For a  company whose wares seem to be progressively concerned with the diminutive, it seems strange to me that they should require such a gargantuan warehouse in which to display them, aligned and mounted on their sparse plinths to be goggled at and fondled .  What seems equally strange is the routine sight of hordes of people eagerly waiting for the doors to this magical kingdom of apps and gizmos to be opened at the stroke of 9am.  The small army of sales staff are positioned in formation along the expansive floor and grand staircase of the shop, waiting for the rush and fondling frenzy to begin.

It all serves as apodictic, the deified status that Apple has in our society, the mythology that has sprung up regarding these palm-sized jujus of data that we covet.  If religion has been replaced by consumerism, then Apple is surely its high priesthood; so ingrained in the belief system of popular culture are its technological commandments.  For many it seems like a trip to this iVatican is like a kind of pilgrimage such is the symbiosis between the way one relates to their iPod, iPhone or iPad, and more out-dated spiritual codes and guidelines.

Further along I reach the intersection of Oxford Circus, where the manic consumerist river of Oxford Street splices its way across Central London.  As I cross over this junction an head upwards towards Portland Place, my attention is momentarily yet routinely caught by a small elderly man, of an uncertain ethnic persuasion (although I believe he may be Turkish or Eygptian), who stands around on the lip of the mouth where tube commuters are burped up from underground.  He holds a tatty laminate A4 sheet labelled 'INTERNET' in one hand, and holds out flyers - presumably for a nearbly web cafe - in the other.  I feel a sort of kind-hearted bemusement whenever I see this persistant yet quite obviously futile commercial venture; a lone vessel bobbing up and down amidst the raging waters of the titanic marketplace all around him.  I also feel a sense of hopeless endeavour considering the omnipotence of the internet nowadays, rather as though he were trying to flog items from his car boot outside Harrods.

Moving up towards Portland Place, one passes a smattering of generic outlets and franchises that homogenise the country, cut-and-pasted throughout every town centre shopping district.  A Caffe Nero, a McDonalds, a Garfunkels restaurant (a benile tourist feeding trough), a Pizza Express and a bland All Bar One (a car showroom of a place) with wine bottles stacked around the wall as though waiting to be dispatched from a warehouse.

At the apex point is the conical spike of All Saints Church that you move towards past all the tyrannical consumerist fluff as though it were the tip of the Enlightenment triangle, perfectly positioned to lure shoppers towards their dematerialising redemption.  A perception eroded somewhat as you curve around alongside the Langham Hotel to reveal the real source of enlightenment - the BBC Broadcasting House.  Its mock-radio aerial seeming to callously mimic the lesser point of All Saints before it.  Like the forces of Apple technology animating the aspirations of the many, it is the all-powerful presence of the broadcast media that has long usurped spirituality in the role of being the predominant beacon of our times. 

Sunk here in his canyon of commerce, purchase power and avarice, this modest church looks as redundant and forgotten as the small man peddling the internet to the tide of the connected, all of whom are already in compulsive servitude to his product.

Culture - November

Books Read:

Andrew Marr - 'The History of Modern Britain' (non-fiction)
William S. Burroughs - 'Interzone'
Ian Fleming - 'Casino Royale'
Friedrich Engels - 'The part played by labour in the transition from ape to man' (non-fiction)

Films Watched:

'The Shining' (Stanley Kubrick) (at BFI Southbank)
'Room 237: Being an inquiry into The Shining in 9 parts' (Rodney Ascher) (at Empire Leicester Square)
'Argo'  (Ben Affleck) (at Ritzy Picturehouse, Brixton)
'Twilight - Breaking Dawn (Part 2)' (at Ritzy Picturehouse, Brixton)

Albums Played:

Tricky - 'Maxinquaye'
Black Sabbath - 'Black Sabbath'
How To Destroy Angels - 'An Omen (EP)'
The Fall - 'Middle Class Revolt'
The Fall - 'The Marshall Suite'
Brian Eno - 'Lux'
Clinic - 'Free Reign'

Exhibitions:

'Henri Cartier-Bresson - A Question of Colour' (at Somerset House) (photography)

Gigs Attended:

The Walkmen - at HMV Forum, Kentish Town, London

Events:
'The Shining: Horror's greatest achievement?' (at BFI Southbank)
'Longford Lecture - Mind-bending behind bars' - Will Self (at Westminister Church Hall)