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Somewhere that's green: Potty the Plant at Wiltons Music Hall

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"I'm Potty the Plant," sings a potted plant in this odd little fringe concept of a show. It's hard not to get the tune out of your head, even if the show is brief. It's an earworm for a show that features a worm-like plant as a puppet. And given the show's brevity, running at only an hour, it's hard to get too annoyed by a lack of a coherent story, even if it still seems like the show could use a bit more development (which is underway). It has made its London debut at Wilton's Music Hall. The premise is that Potty, the plant, lives in the hospital office of Dr Acula (geddit?) and dreams of a life with the cleaning lady Miss Lacey (Lucy Appleton). But Dr Acula might be responsible for why all these children are disappearing while trying to romance Miss Lacey for her family's money that she doesn't have. Three nurses are on the case, trying to solve the mystery.  If the show settled on a convincing plot, location and set of characters, it could ...

Art: Shadow Catchers Camera-Less Photography


Shadow Catchers - V&A from Sound Films on Vimeo.

The Victoria and Albert Museum has been running an excellent little exhibition since October last year on Shadow Catchers: Camera-less photography and I managed to take a look at it over the weekend.

After brushing up on what a photogram is via the Art of Photography (basically its an image created by placing an object on light sensitive paper), we headed over to the V&A to look at some shadows...

This exhibition is an opportunity take in some extraordinary pieces that leave a lot up to the imagination, or at least provoke it a little. The low light of the exhibition space helps, and adds a moody atmosphere.

There is beauty with the simplicity of the works, particularly those that hinted at absent objects. They appeared less impressive when combined with other photographic techniques, although it is easy to appreciate the effort required in their production. It is at the V&A until February 20... Initial boo thoughts below...

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