I eventually managed to get to Shunt last weekend, and it was one of the most incredible spaces I have ever set foot in. I can’t think of a space more perfect for hosting my installation idea. A labyrinth of tunnels and vaults under London Bridge Station, and steeped in history, the venue was used for over 100 years to provide storage for wine before it was distributed by train throughout the country. Shunt is actually a collaborative of 10 artists, not the venue itself, yet they use it to its full capacity.
Stepping through the inconspicuous plain black doorway, you wonder if you’ve arrived in the right place. A cramped, dimly lit lobby leads straight to the exhibitions. You pay your money and carry on, exploring the brick vaults. To the sides are occasional small doorways with a warm glow and people spilling out. Inside these tiny chambers, what seems like hundreds of people are captivated by an artist playing piano or singing. Groups of peculiarly dressed individuals rush around, chatting and drinking. It’s unclear whether they are performers or visitors. You feel like you’re part of an underground cult. Moving on you meet the first installation piece, and immediately you are plunged into darkness as your eyes struggle to adjust. There is a long, narrow walkway spanning the length of a vast, vaulted space, with a doorway at the very end. The only light source is a single floodlight behind the door, casting shadows from silhouettes as people reach the end of the space and move through to the next.
As your eyes begin to adjust, you realise the strange whisperings you heard were not entirely imagined. Moving shapes emerge from the pitch-black catacombs which run perpendicular to the main space. Small groups sit quietly in the darkness. The space draws you onwards, the feint hum of music becoming louder and louder. You explore further installations and spaces. There is a small room with a pool table which leads through to a hallway in which a rather eccentric band blasts out their songs to an appreciative crowd. More and more of these deeply interesting spaces appear, and within 10 minutes of entering you feel lost and disorientated. The great thing is that you just don’t care, it’s all part of the fun.
The culmination of your wanderings always seems to lead you to the main bar space. This epic expanse is a double, even triple-height space littered with columns which support huge brick archways, and filled with thumping music. The odd performance artist wanders by, doing something strange. I bought a couple of homemade cookies from a nice bloke at the end of a dark tunnel. It seemed quite normal at the time.
Whilst exploring one installation (a miniature, wooden pantheon perchance), I spotted a nondescript, hand-painted white arrow on a wall in the very corner of a seating space. Between a couple of sets of ladders, the arrow looked like it had been painted by a workman to mark the route of a service cable, but upon closer inspection it pointed to yet another tiny opening, through which a short candle-lined corridor led to another tiny exhibition space. The space was hosting a small exhibition by an art student from Birmingham, and it struck me as the ideal place to hold my own installation. After a conversation with the student however, it became apparent that this would be very unlikely. I was told that because of overwhelming demand, Shunt simply weren’t considering any more artistic proposals. It seems a very much ‘who you know not what you know’ sort of place. That’s not to say the events and installations are poor of course.
Shunt was a thoroughly unique and entertaining experience, yet I left a little disappointed. Partially because I knew how unlikely it is for me to use the space to host my installation, and partially because in a few months the complex will close for the final time, being filled with concrete as part of the foundation system for The Shard.
Posted in General, MA Thesis | No Comments | Bookmark or Share
No Comments
No comments yet.
