Proposal Outline

To replace the existing Camden Council Notices (see image 5) with plaques of the same format but displaying film script headings (sample image 6).

Rationale

This proposal takes as its starting point one use European cinema has made of Modernist architecture: that of ‘crime scene’; or site of impending accident. To list just two, in Mike Hodges’ Get Carter (1971) it is the roof terrace that Bumbry is flung from. In Mike Lee’s, All or Nothing, (1993) it is the housing estate recreation area where Jamie has his heart attack.

These narratives have implicated all such spaces, including Park Hill, and have shaped or produced our experience of them. But the direction of influence between Modernist site and cinema narrative has not been all one way. The housing estate has, with hindsight, revealed itself to be an ill-considered model of citizen control and segregation on the basis of existing wealth and influence. The removal of these estates from the everyday hubbub of the street, the numerous prohibition plaques that punctuate their facades and the over-designated areas in all areas of life from refuse disposal to recreation bear witness to this.

My proposal is to consider the Brunswick Centre as a film set (I can’t avoid this) but to replacing Camden Council’s existing things-you-can’t-do signage with open-ended instructions to actors.

The new signage would take the same format (engraved orange Perspex) and location as the existing signs.

Other samples: