I’ve never been convinced that the complex of arts-based venues known as London’s South Bank matches up to a genuine international standard. A recent visit confirmed for me that it doesn’t even meet ordinary British standards, falling behind Salford/Manchester, Newcastle/Gateshead and no doubt many others. I’m well aware that mine is not the first voice to be raised in anger over this issue, but there seems to be an imperative to keep plugging away in the hope that somebody will eventually take notice.
It starts with a fairground – an aquarium and a very, very slowly rotating wheel called an eye, located in what used to be the Jubilee Gardens, and before that the 1951 Festival of Britain site. Behind the Eye is a playground. The rest of the old Gardens is grassed, except where poor maintenance and equally poor design allows it to turn into mud. From the top of the Eye it looks just as bad, no, worse than the surprising mess that hides behind the bland facade of the old County Hall. The arches under the run-in to Hungerford Railway Bridge could be attractive but they too have caught the messy disease. The Shell Centre backdrop is simply unmemorable.
Moving along, there’s the refurbished Royal Festival Hall, which is the one building that has truly survived the test of time. Even the promenade area separating it from the river is well handled although some of the trees are looking past their best, having been pruned to unsympathetic forms. Inside, the RFH is OK, but its hard to see where all the money has gone. Between this and the ghost of Jubilee Gardens, the railway bridge has recently had new pedestrian bridges tacked onto both sides of it, replacing the old, rather spartan one that used to be stuck on to the east side. The new structures are aesthetically jarring influences and make a mess of the views both to Charing Cross station and the RFH . They are well over the top, and scream Look at me. Sadly, nothing else is visible except through the jumble of steel and cables that provide a corridor for the trains.
Next door is Lasdun’s complex of Queen Elizabeth Hall, Hayward Gallery and National Theatre. In Scotland wed call it a national disgrace. The materials were ill-chosen and the building forms poorly judged. The open undercroft at the front quickly became skateboard heaven. It remains probably the best venue for this street sport anywhere in Britain, which is not to acknowledge that it has design merit. Far from it. Graffiti artists moved in and covered the walls, columns, ceilings and some of the paving with randomly applied spray paint that makes the original dirty, exposed rough-finished concrete appear half decent by comparison. In short, its an awful mess. And yet this is the front door to Britain’s premier arts complex. At the back door, or somewhere down there, out of sight, used to be the entrance to the Museum of the Moving Image – a splendid place on the inside, tawdry on the outside. It closed in 1999.
All around, perched on top of the various buildings, are Gormley’s gormless figures, part of his Event Horizon installation. If his next project involves hundreds of figures modelled on himself, half buried in a hillside somewhere in the North Downs, I won’t be at all surprised.
So, this is it then. Is it a world class environment? No. Are they world class buildings? No, mostly. Apart from the Eye, obviously, does the South Bank complex leave you with an uplifting environmental experience? No, again. Like the Home Office, it is not fit for purpose. Never has been, never will be, unless and if we throw a whole lot of regeneration money at it and get some clever architects and landscape architects on board to spend it. Many schemes have been proposed over the years, but none has ever made the breakthrough. Isn’t it time to do that, now? Something on the scale of Paris’s Grands Projets is needed and I for one would change the impulse of a lifetime and vote for Ken Livingstone if he could fix it.
Large parts of The South Bank have had a taste bypass. The last reference to appear on the DCMS website referring to this sites problems is from February 2002, when Lord Hollick was appointed chairman of the South Bank Board. Tessa Jowell said:
“The range and quality of the arts at the South Bank Centre stands comparison with the very best anywhere. But the artists, audiences and wider public are poorly served by the buildings, public spaces and infrastructure which have deteriorated over the last half century.
Five and a half years later (fifty six years, if we’re honest), the story is the same. Come on, pull your fingers out. Get the job done!
DO YOU AGREE with Gordon or do you love Southbank? Have your say on the Editor’s Desk.
