Sad to see the other day that the Antony Gormley man had disappeared from Waterloo bridge. The bronze casts of Gormley that stood and silently stared out from their perches all around the South Bank had been with us all summer. I'd heard about them before I encountered the one on Waterloo bridge, but it was something different to see it in the flesh, as it were.
I felt a kind of pulling. I felt as though if I stood as still as that 'man' was, I would feel stuck, and pulled. There's such an onwards rush in London. We people, like molecules, flow along as rivers, as streams (watch the suits emerge from London Bridge station in the morning - they pour over the bridge into the City - it's quite a sight). And to stand still amongst all that is just not done.
Yes, tourists dither, consult maps, take snapshots. And there are homeless people who are separate from the fray - hunched at the side of the streets. But who stands, just stands and is?
Just the little bronze men, so far as I know.
That was really powerful to me. It made me want to stop and stand and see everything rushing around me. And it served as a contrast, a quiet comment on our franticness.
Others have made much of the way the statues seemed to look after or over the people below then. How it wasn't clear whether they were surveying the landscape or contemplating a jump.
I just loved the stillness. The reminder to be still.
Pictures of the sculptures http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/gallery/2007/may/03/art?picture=329805762
Interview with Lalitaraja about stillness and meditation in dance http://www.dharmalife.com/issue26/stillness.html
Article about recent collaborative work between Antony Gormley, Akram Khan, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Nitin Sawnhey http://arts.guardian.co.uk/features/story/0,,1526373,00.html
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