London Love.

Flippin' A!

 Our 1 year old has taken to walloping of late. That random, didn't see it coming, arm back, smack in the face sort. Always timed when I am attempting a serious conversation with another adult and he (Asa) deems it inappropriate to the schedule he had planned, namely eating, playing, eating some more and then sleeping with his jumbo soft toy that needs its own mode of transport to manouvre it. I rather admire his approach in halting my waffle and often can't help but chuckle at his timing, as I look at him in shock while he sizes me up for another blow - 'wham, take that woman!' I've had enough little folk now to understand the term 'phases' and 'boundaries' but after an embarassing incident in our local park this week, where he left evidence of his misdoings all over the face of another small person (he had been examining the oily wheel of a car prior to the attack), I felt it was time to introduce my young offender to a bit of culture. We live in an amazing city, piled high with art, architecture and museums. It was time to step this nurturing thing up a gear. 

 Tacita Dean, a British artist, now based in Berlin, is the 12th artist commissioned to install a piece of work in the Tate Modern' Turbine Hall. All of our children have spent many hours over the years, running around this fantastic space and the excuse to visit is always just one whack too many away. So on Wednesday Asa and I did just that and we felt exceptionally lucky. London can be perceived as a dirty, overcrowded, overpriced metropolis, belching out fumes and noises often indistinguishable to our country counterpart but for all of that there is an unquantifiable energy of creativity and to have exposure to so much is a heavy weight in the balance that favours our life here. Tacita Deans work, entitled Film, is a homage to analogue film, a medium which, in the digital age is fast becoming extinct. Stretching the whole height of the hall, it commands your immediate attention as you sit, engulfed by the blackness of the space, eyes drawn towards her everchanging, calming and hypnotic images. Asa loved it. What had I been waiting for, pushing him on swings and shadowing him around playgrounds these last few months? 'Culture me up mama.' Next week Gerhard Richter is on his hit-list (and that's not the walloping kind!). I love this kind of reform.

That's my boy, calling forth another mini.

'Good work Tacita. Who needs a swing, eh?'