The Mugger and The Artist.



Cycling from my home to Toynbee  Studios is a pleasure. On the way I pass the monika
bobinska
gallery on Cambridge Heath Road .  Monika herself is repainting the outside of
the gallery which was vivid from it’s previous show Real Phoney. I stop at the lights and look at the gallery. The window is adorened with gold lettering REAL PHONEY by Sinta Tantra. I know Sinta Tantra. I introduced one of her exhibitions A Good Time By Half at
The Southbank Centre. The intro is on Youtube…

 While having these thoughts Sinta explodes out of the gallery “Lemn” she smiles “Come in.” Sinta is  originally from Bali and I am honoured to see her  exhibition while it
is being dismantled.  Art at the start of the day – perfect.  We have a good chat
and I leave wishing I had seen the exhibition or been at its opening;    Onwards to Toynbee.   Here I meet Anna Cole the original stage manager for Something Dark. This week  I am in rehearsals for my  one man play  and then off to South Africa on
Monday. 

It’s a good day. At the end I cycle home and as I pass an alleyway  a guy with dreadlocks and white hat runs out into the road  across it and away. I saw him throw something.  It was
a purse. Thieves take out the credit cards and throw the evidence away. I stop on the road and take my bike up the alleyway. Maybe there was some woman in shock! I look up the narroway a white stocky man with a walkytalky  is running towards me another white man with a walkytalky is holding a black man who is remonstrating.

“has there been a robbery”  I shout.  The man speeding towards me is a plain close police officer. He looks at me  while still running.  “the wallet is on the floor and the guy ran
that way” I tell him and he continues  leaving the purse with its credit cards strewn upon the floor. I get back on my bike and continue home.   

At home an  email from Jude Kelly arrives,  the artistic director of the southbank centre.  It’s  letting us know about the The Hayward Gallery’s opening exhibition tonight.   It’s tonight. And here I am at home.  I missed it. Another exhibition I missed.   But being artist in residence means that I get the pleasure of working two seconds from the Hayward Gallery and I will see the exhibition again and again and again.  It is called Walking In My Mind.


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