Somerset House – WholeArsed

Breaking our supposed rule never to see a play on the first night we arrive in London, we located reasonably-priced tickets to Thursday’s production of the musical The Devil Wears Prada. It was easy to break because, as evidenced by even events in the dark on the last night of a trip to London, I still seem to be able to sleep through parts of any production.

I am a complete sucker for the movie and cannot resist watching it when it’s available on a streaming service. Meryl Streep is so deliciously bitchy. I could never tire of her delivery of “That is all….” Now, Meryl Steep is of course not in the musical, but add music by Elton John, how can this not be a load of fun?

Well, it was a load of fun. They liberally used much of the movie (which in turn was probably from the book, which I have not read). The actress playing–I’m just going to call it–Meryl Streep’s character (because she OWNED that role) couldn’t begin to match Meryl but she played it her way and it worked. The music was wonderful, the costumes were great, the actors did a wonderful job.

And, yes, I did doze off some. But I’ve watched the movie dozens of time. I could still follow the plot.

On Friday morning we embarked on an excursion to the The Somerset House where there was an exhibit on Soil. Yes, Soil.

It was unbelievably fascinating. Photos of tiny bacteria blown up huge, video of the sights and sounds of roots growing, a mesmerizing video of the development of a mushroom, including ethereal flows of spores. Information on gardening techniques. Stories of human response to plants, flowers, gardens. Every time I tried to hurry along some new narrative or visual captured my attention. Highly, highly recommend this exhibit.

That afternoon we took a long train ride to a different kind of exhibit, God’s Own Junkyard. This is a museum of neon signs, many created by one artist, Chris Bracey, who sadly passed away in in 2014 due to cancer. You can walk through the museum and see the works of neon art displayed and there’s a little coffee shop to sit and enjoy them while relaxing. It is very cool, and very overwhelming.

One thing that became clear to me seeing the Soil exhibit and this one in one day is the power of narrative. The way Soil was exhibited helped you to notice things you might have glossed over. God’s Own Junkyard had every square inch covered with neon signs and art. It was hard to appreciate each one individually.

But perhaps that is the point.

Later that day we went out to Battersea Power Station to view installations for the Light Festival. Battersea Power Station was formerly a literal source of electrical power for London that had been closed down in 1983 and much later converted to a very fancy mall. The light festival was a little, well, little, eight installations from very awesome to kind of ho-hum. But the mall….I am not a shopper but it was beautiful. I especially loved that they retained the old towers from the original building when they built the mall. It’s also full of old equipment from its past as a power station. There is an unbelievable amount of housing development around the mall. One of the reasons I love visiting London is the juxtaposition of old buildings to new, modern ones. This area was all new, but it was all awesome.

Our final tour was to the Brunel Museum, a museum in Southwark on the site of an engineering marvel of a tunnel under the Thames that was built by a father and son team. The tunnel was intended to allow movement of goods from one side of the Thames to another during a time when heavy boat traffic on the Thames made it very difficult to add bridges. The tunnel was started in 1825 and finished in 1843. It was never used to transport goods and initially was more popular as a tourist attraction for pedestrians. It is now used for train travel, ironically, by the London Overground.

You can enter the original shaft and, in the museum, view exhibits and equipment displaying how the tunnel was built and all the challenges the engineers and construction crew faced. Great little museum.

And close by, nice views of the city on a somewhat dreary London day.

We woke up in London on Saturday morning after a long flight, a nap, a late, delicious lunch and an Old Fashioned at the fabulous Indian restaurant Dishoom, a drenching rain, a cup of tea, and a decent night’s sleep. We found ourselves again at the CitizenM, this time in Shoreditch. Again, not because we love it so much, but hotels were in short supply this weekend at our price point.

In fact, we had to go well above our price point even to stay at the CitizenM. The London Marathon was on Sunday and the supply of hotels had been eaten up by the healthy and driven folk who engage in such things.

As you may recall, Shoreditch is a slightly gritty neighborhood known for its nightlife and street art. I love the street art, but it is hard not to notice a more commercial leaning in the art since the last time we visited this area. It seems that businesses are now hiring artists to paint their exteriors rather than the random artist showing up in the dead of night to make his or her mark. And maybe these new ones are not just normal artists. This morning (now Sunday) I encountered a group of people next to a truck in front of some street art that appeared to be under some renovation. The people were wearing neon work vests with the words “Global Street Art” on them. I can only hope this is a way that the artists among us are able to engage in their life’s work and earn a good living. Something about it felt a little disappointing.

Photo: WholeArsed

Still, I loved looking at all of the street art, even the commercial kind, as we were out and about. This turned out to be quite a lot as the CitizenM in Shoreditch is not really close to the Tube. Every time we turned a corner we saw some new art to enjoy.

I mentioned a good night’s sleep. That was actually only me. My husband arose far too early and spent his time reading the news and researching where we might be able to attain an early-ish breakfast. The match against Tottenham was very early, 12:30 p.m., perhaps to minimize the amount of alcohol to be consumed by fans beforehand. Most of the breakfast to be had nearby was available at 11 a.m., not going to cut it on a day we were determined to be at the stadium early. We ended up selecting the Savoy Kitchen, a lovely but small cafe that started serving breakfast at 8 a.m. The yogurt bowl and porridge were works of art themselves, and hit the spot.

We hopped on a bus to head over to an art installation at the Somerset House courtyard. The installation was created by Portuguese artist Grada Kilomba, and represents the shape of a ship, like those that carried millions of Africans against their will and humanity into Western enslavement.

The memorial was constructed of charred blocks, in which a poem also created by the artist was inscribed in gold, line by line, in some of the blocks.

It was a moving display, made more so by the glistening of the blocks and the shadow cast under the morning sun. The shadow of our history continues to darken our present.