- Venue
- Smiths Row Gallery
- Location
- East England
Architecture is a field open to many different discourses, formal, political and utilitarian. At Smiths Row, Bury St Edmunds, Oscar Niemeyer’s modernist projects for post-colonial Algeria in 1970s are the subject of photographs by Jason Oddy. He makes us aware both of the origins of the buildings and their life today. The way building are inhabited and looked after clearly impacts on how we perceive them.
Taking up this theme, as part of an off-site programme, artist and architect Helen Stratford explores Bury St Edmunds’ Cornhill Walk shopping centre. It opened in 1988 as a ‘modern shopping experience’ and since then has played host to a variety of events including baby pageants and fashion shows. The artist was ‘in residence’ there on Saturday 1 March and I went along to find out more. Stratford’s invitation had included an image of Cornhill Walk at dusk with the artist in characteristic bright red tights just visible in the passport photo booth. I had no idea what to expect but discovered that visitors could have their photos taken in the booth against a background of the shopping centre in its heyday crowded with shoppers.
That Saturday afternoon, with more than two thirds of the units vacant, shoppers were few and far between. A dining table and chairs, lent by one of the retailers and still with price tags on, was set out in the atrium and here Stratford was welcoming visitors. Some of the history of the building was presented in the form of printed articles and two fascinating books of press cuttings, compiled over the years by Chrissie Harrod, the centre manager. Stratford’s correspondence with the project architect, Paul Duenas, then working for BDP Architects, London, revealed how the design concept invited comparison with celebrated 19th century precedents in London and Milan. It was promoted for its impressive atrium, high quality emulsion, terrazzo flooring, water features (subsequently removed) and seasonal planting. The seminal essay Things to Do with Shopping Centres by Meaghan Morris (1988) was also on the table. This impressive array demonstrated that the artist had done her research, even if the circumstances were not conducive to close examination. Stratford had homed in on how the central ‘public’ gallery had been used. Examples of ‘things to do with a shopping centre’ included, empty fourth plinth ideas, performances in the fountain, baby and toddler contests and teddy parades.
One visitor in particular was getting into the spirit of the event. Local amateur photographer Michael Smith had brought along his collection of photos of the changes in Bury St Edmunds streets over the years. He said that if he knew anything was going to be altered he made it his mission to document it. Gathered around him, people were commenting and reminiscing. A heated conversation arose about the destruction of the old and much loved art deco Odeon Cinema to make way for the present shopping centre. Through her subtle intervention, Stratford got us thinking about the difference between the designer’s meaning and the users meaning, as discussed by Anos Rupoport in The Meaning of the Built Environment (1982)
Stratford had also arranged hourly tours behind-the-scenes led by Ed who had worked in the shopping centre as a security guard all of his working life. We left the atrium through one of the emergency exits, following Ed down long wide corridors, stopped at the management suite, which had originally been a caretaker’s flat and still had a fully equipped domestic bathroom, looked into vast deserted stockrooms, inspected the automatic smoke vents outside on the roof and the turning turntable in the car park, built but never put into service. Ed had a personal story for each space and the building seemed to be a perfect vindication of Bachelard’s analysis in The Poetic of Space (1952) of architecture as lived experience. The contrast between the small central atrium and the huge service areas was staggering. Ed captivated us with stories of his own and his colleagues’ experiences in the centre, including several encounters with ghosts. Ed told us about the success of the place and how one Saturday the anchor store ‘Index’ took £84.000. Ed knew the building, cared about it and looked after it. In his navy blue suit, his hair closely cropped and his impeccable manner, he helped us to understand the building, to see it through caring eyes from the perspective of a devoted member of staff. In its heyday Cornhill Walk would have had little to interest me but here I was at an art event having fun and making conversation with the most unexpected people.
I nearly forgot to mention that Stratford had a final surprise for us once the last shoppers had left. We watched as the cleaners mopped the floor of the atrium in perfect synchronisation, in time to the piped music, as they did every day with or without an audience.
Caroline Wendling
