Trafalgar Square

[poliphilo]

Trafalgar Square is lot nicer since they pedestrianized the north side. And thanks to Mayor Livingstone’s ban on peanut vendors there are fewer pigeons than there used to be. It’s not a favourite space of mine. None of the architecture is quite grand and/or interesting enough. The dome of the National Gallery is a silly little pepper pot which fails to dominate as it should.

All the statues are of nineteenth century military heroes- mostly long-forgotten ones. Sic transit. There’s one empty plinth and we’ve got an ongoing national debate about who should be stuck on top of it. I’d vote for leaving it empty. We’ve lost the knack of creating convincing public sculpture. We know too much about human nature to have heroes in the old sense. What we have in their place are celebrities- who are part wet dream, part ducks in a shooting gallery.

We had afternoon tea in the crypt of St Martin in the Fields- the church at the north-east corner of the square. They do a mean gooseberry and rhubarb crumble. And the floor is paved with 18th century gravestones.

Comments

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

But Londoners hate Mrs T.

A statue of her, exhibited in the Guildhall I think, recently had its head knocked off. Any public statue of her would be likely to share its fate.

[archyena.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I read that. It's a pity and a waste. Whatever drives people to think that it does any good at all eludes me. For that matter, I'm of the opinion that art (even art that may be propaganda) is something fairly sacred. Perhaps that's my perception from growing up in the Midwest where there is little art of any sort, we'd have killed for that statue in a suitably public venue. It would need a plaque explaining who the person was so people would know, but everyone would agree that it's a lovely statue and we'd be happy to have more of the same.