Of late a tradition has taken hold in which the passing of a person, or of a group of people, is marked by a minute's cheering or clapping instead of the more traditional minute's silence (two if the situation is deemed suitably grave). That's probably down to all the badly observed silences at football matches caused by partisan rivalry and, let's be honest, no little booze.
The Imperial War Museum's current, frankly quite peculiar, exhibition Moments of Silence holds no truck with that. Very possibly, when dealing with war, silence is the only respectful option. It suggests a break from the sound of gunfire, the screams of pain, and the noise of bombs exploding. I dare suppose that, following a war, silence (or at least peace and quiet) is the most sought after sound. Pity some don't find it 'til they're dead.
All good stuff but as an exhibition, Moments of Silence is certainly an odd one. I really wasn't sure what to make of it, what I was supposed to do. "If a tree falls in a forest and there is no one around to hear it, does it make a sound?" is an oft-asked rhetorical question but this show had me wondering "If a one minute silence is observed but no one is around to not hear it, was it really silence?".
I mean, I've been to unusual exhibitions before. Weird ones, fun ones, confusing ones, and even absolutely fucking shit ones. It's not all looking at nice paintings, I get that, but, usually, there's at least something to look at. The theme of Moments of Silence, it seems, is absence. Not just absence of sound but absence of vision. There's a few darkened corridors that lead, with one exception, to even darker rooms that you stand in and listen to pre-recorded silences that, for the most part, are not totally silent. There's a sort of ambient hum of background noise. A bit like walking into a Wetherspoons pub at 11am on a Tuesday morning. But not quite as depressing.
As such, it's difficult bordering on impossible to credit any of the artists (sound or vision) because there's nothing to say who made these works and even if there were, for the most part I'd not have been able to read it. As I walked from one darkened room to another pondering the cruelty of life and the meaningless of existence I realised I probably could have stayed at home and experienced much the same feeling.
At least the first room had something going on. An illusion of pebbles or gravel falling on a shore. I presumed this was to symbolise the tragic waste of life and a brief information board before I entered seemed to confirm my interpretation. The back story is that, following the end of World War I, the British government had proposed a National Hall of Remembrance but when this wasn't built, memorial instead took the form of a series of two minute silences (alongside other, smaller, physical memorials).
It's a pity they didn't build it (not least because Charles Holden had accepted the gig and had already started designing it, and artists like Paul Nash and Stanley Spencer created artworks for the interior) but the tradition that came instead is now, football matches etc; aside, one that has become firmly entrenched. We all know how to observe a silence respectfully and we've all done it more times than we'd care to remember. We probably shall again.
In a crowded stadium, at work, or even (following the 2005 London bombings) on the streets it has a power, undoubtedly, but in a gallery that's already completely quiet it's kind of pointless. I walked down a dark corridor into another dark room, nearly bumped into some foam, had what would have been an awkward encounter with my only fellow visitor had I been able to see him and him me, and wondered how long I should 'enjoy' the 'silence' before moving on.
Nobody was looking so it wasn't long. Following yet another long dark corridor (is this what dying is like?) I came out in a surprisingly well lit room. But don't, for one moment, think that meant the darkness of the experience had lifted. Quite the opposite. Inscribed, very faintly, on each wall was a list of names of all the civilian casualties of the Iraqi war. 13,482 in total. Oh, and it was part of an addendum to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission which lists 1,058,937 entries/deaths from World War I. What a lovely world we live in.
Though it's both useful and necessarily painful to be reminded just how many people have been killed due to the lies of politicians, myths of nationalism, greed for money, and desire to run our cars 'efficiently', this room, alas, marked the end of any political element to the show and my feet ushered me into what I'd hoped would be some kind of explanation of it all but was in fact the end of the exhibition. My art experience had ended as quickly as some people's war did. Though with less blood and amputation.
On exiting this rather odd show I was informed the moments of silence I'd 'heard' had come from such disparate places as Somerset House ice rink, a McVitie's biscuit factory in Harlesden, the African and Caribbean War Memorial in Brixton, St.Paul's Cathedral, Everest Base Camp in Nepal, St Ann's Square in Manchester, St Boniface Primary School in Tooting, the Cenotaph, and Derby County Football Club.
There was even a short film of various individuals, lots of school kids, marking their own silences. While it's undoubtedly good to remember, and to let people know you remember, it seems that the Moments of Silence show at the Imperial War Museum will be consigned to history pretty quickly. Like war, a spectacular failure but, unlike war, at least a noble aim.
I went to Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park and sat silently reading my paper and taking in the world around me. It was better than the darkness but, perhaps, just maybe, the darkness made the light shine brighter.
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