woobiquity

lxxxi. Of one word that says it all

From the occasional series: 'the power of language'. Lift, Woolwich Town Hall, yesterday.

lxxx. Of what's just above my head

Boy George has not turned up to his book launch, unless he is a) keeping an uncharacteristically low profile or b) the true identity of the meringue-like Leigh Bowery impersonator blinking from behind a black silk ski mask on a raised throne in the center of the room.

I wish for the latter, since attending your own party disguised as the caricature centerpiece would be the ultimate pop-opera twist. But this fantasy bites the dust when said caricature looks down at me and purrs, ‘do you like my shoes?’ in a deep French accented voice. We move along.

Look up in London and you’re in a completely different city. This is almost always true in the out of doors, where the tight, street level grime of our modern metropolis is a world removed from the Victorian, Edwardian, neo-Romanesque or Modernist splendor one storey up.

It is also sometimes true in London’s quirkier interiors, and it’s certainly the case in this vast drawing room in the lavish former countess’ residence cum private members’ club at 20 Portman Square.

At eye level, it’s wall-to-wall Desperate Socialites, and I’ve been wondering since the self-important glances and pleas of guest list oversight mixing it up on the door why anyone would want to frequent this particular circuit. But above all else, the ceiling is a Georgian dream. Truly I think it is the most beautiful ceiling I have ever seen. And that’s not just the bottomless glass of Champagne talking.

Fast forward to this morning, when Willie and I arrive at the (to us) surprisingly ornate Woolwich Town Hall prepared to affirm our allegiance to Queen Elizabeth and her heirs in a private citizenship ceremony.

If this sounds glamorous or pretentious, it was not conceived as such, and the Six Feet Under style consultation room we are eventually ushered into will soon confirm the civil utilitarian nature of what we are about to undertake. Above all that will be the incomprehensible, Labour-scripted language of love seeded through the Superintendent Register’s introduction to the event. It seems we are about to enter into membership of the “full British family”…

But for now we must wait for the backlogs of bureaucracy to run their course. We must wait in the sun-flooded vastness of a great hall presided over by a portly statue of Queen Victoria. Stick a ski mask on her and she could be the party’s mystery guest. Look up and there is one of the world’s finest ceilings.

A highly-cast symmetry is taking shape here, and as I notice the backside of the flat screen on the far end of the room, a flat screen almost identical in proportion to the one from the night before, from which Boy George (made up as Leigh Bowery) teased us for our eagerness, I am tempted to walk toward the door just to see. But I have learned my lesson about things like this and look back up at the ceiling instead.

lxxix. Of more fluorescence in the retail arts

'You make my heart go boom boom.' They're not the words you expect to see over the reception desk of a luxury hotel, and perhaps for that reason alone my friends and I dismissed them with snide comments while waiting to check in. And perhaps for that reason alone the Great Eastern deserves to be considered one of the world's great hotels. That is, for daring to replace the landscapes and staid portraits with actual art -- the kind that disorients and makes us react.