Monday, 5 December 2005

Arts

Embankment

Here's something else to do on a Saturday in London: explore the latest work in the Unilever Series of massive installations in Tate Modern's Turbine Hall.

[The crowd moving through Embankment] [pab reflected amidst the boxes]

The popular comparisons are easy to make. Rachel Whiteread's sculpture looks like a stack of giant sugar-cubes or an abandoned yet pristine warehouse. Just about the only one I find hard to see is the work's title, Embankment.

Once again it's a piece that filled me with a sense of wonder. Five minutes later the sense had worn off - I didn't really connect with it. The feeling I come away with is that of a tourist who's ticked off another sight.

[Boxes towering above, eclipsing the light] [The glass wall, doubling the size of the turbine hall]

On the other hand, I am interested in how Tate will store this work once it's dismantled. I imagine Anish Kapoor's Marsyas rolled up in a tent bag somewhere. Olafur Eliasson's The Weather Project probably neatly packs down into a couple of boxes.

With Embankment, the art is the boxes. In six months time when it is taken down perhaps it'll become that abandoned warehouse it seems to be in the first place.

Posted by pab at 22:54 | Comments will be back later in the year. Please email me instead!