- Venue
- outside Tate Modern Turbine Hall entrance
- Date
- Friday, June 24, 2016
05:00 PM - Address
- Bankside SE1 9TG London
- Location
- London
Hello! My name is Kenji Lim and I am an artist based in the village of Cradley in East Herefordshire, just in the shadow of the Malvern Hills. In June 2016 I will be walking to London and I am asking people to come and meet me at the finish line — outside the Tate Modern — and contribute to the text work I will make from it. I have given myself ten days to walk from Herefordshire to London and will pass through every place I have lived in the UK, starting in Cradley on 15th June and going through Worcester (where I went to school), Drakes Broughton (where my grandparents lived and where I first arrived in the UK from Singapore when I was four), Oxford (where I went to university) and finishing in London (where I tried to get a real job) on the 24th June. This journey will be around 180 miles.
I will be staying at friends’ houses and B&Bs, walking on footpaths and backroads, and for a large portion of the way using the Shakespeare’s Way long distance path from Stratford-on-Avon to London. The finishing point of the walk will be outside the Turbine Hall of the Tate Modern (or inside if it’s raining) on Friday 24th June at around 5 or 6pm and I would like to invite anyone who is interested to come and meet me there.
I would really like the final work I produce from this to have a contribution from everyone who comes to the end of the walk at the Tate that evening. Therefore I’d like everyone who comes to be prepared to write a short statement beginning “I came here because…” to say why you decided to come along. *Please don’t come with a prewritten statement, I’d like you to respond to the event, not the idea of the event. It is important to me that you write it there.* Statements will remain anonymous. The next day — Saturday 25th June — I will return to the spot where we meet and transcribe all the statements as well as my own daily journal from the walk onto a paper scroll. This will take as long as is required, several hours at least, and will start at around midday. Please feel free to come along to this as well if you wish (although I will not be taking additional contributions, you need to be there on Friday to do that!)
I have set up a Facebook event to keep anyone who wishes to know up to date with my progress, including any changes to schedule and, as the finish line approaches, an ever more accurate ETA. Please feel free to share, invite others to join and come along at the end, and we can all go and have a pint after. This is an open invitation and so I’d love people to share it around to those who may be interested in this project and would like to contribute something. I’d just ask that if possible please RSVP on this event so that I’ll know if I need help when I get there!
If you’d like to know more about my work and what I’ve done in the past you can visit my website www.kenjilim.com or my Facebook page. My email is [email protected] of you have any questions.
