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Still here: While They Were Waiting - Upstairs At The Gatehouse

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As the song goes, time heals everything. Or as another song says, it's time after time. Yet waiting—for a moment, a minute, or even a while—can feel like a chore. In Gary Wilmot’s slightly absurd and silly While They Were Waiting, the focus is on waiting and wordplay. No opportunity is missed to find more than one meaning in what is said. A debate arises about the difference between a smidge and a whisker. There's a playful riff on how you can be here and over there at the same time, depending on your standpoint. If this piece has a point at all, it depends on what you find funny. The concept of waiting-related language is, in itself, amusing, and there is plenty to laugh about in this show. It’s currently playing at Upstairs at the Gatehouse . The premise is simple: Mulbery (Steve Furst) arrives for an appointment and is kept waiting. What the appointment is for, we are not clear about but he is waiting for a yellow door to open. Nobody answers when he rings. He’s joined by th...

Subterranean art: Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2012


The Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2012 designed by Herzog & de Meuron and Ai Weiwei is described as an opportunity to inspire visitors to look beneath the surface of the park as well as back in time at the ghosts of the earlier structures.
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With its cork surfaces and dark corners what it really is is the ultimate children's playground. It will be hard to visit it without finding screaming children running about, hiding from each other in the dark corners and leaping over the uneven surfaces. There is place for a good coffee, but this year's pavilion is a cork dungeon for the children. The little buggers will love it...
It is open until 14 October. 

Be sure to also catch the other free exhibition at the gallery itself - Yoko Ono's To the Light which runs until 9 September.


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