B&W gallery: Half a boat

This curious sight has now been visible for at least ten years behind a row of shops on

London's South Bank. It appears to be a small dinghy cut in half and then abandoned on

what looks like a small stage set. Being so close to the Tate Modern perhaps it's a piece of

installation art, but if it is nobody's bought it or even owned up to it. Perhaps it is a small

stage prop, for a nightly performance of... what? Moby Dick? Billy Budd?, a very low-budget

one-man Titanic? (There are no stage lights, so it's probably not that.) No, probably just an

eccentric Englishman's idea of a joke.

I'll never know now, but one would have thought that the value of the real estate it's sitting

on would have seen this half-boat removed years ago and the corner plot now sporting an

outlet for more tourist dross of the sort that disfigures much else in this area (though I'd be

the last to deny any visitor to London his or her share of the delights of the South Bank,

including the Globe Theatre, the Festival Hall complex, the Tate, the old Clink jail, and much

more). Where this was once the site of the 'Stews of London' it's now its most entertaining

and agreeable playground.

This curious sight has now been visible for at least ten years behind a row of shops on London's

South Bank. It appears to be a small dinghy cut in half and then abandoned on what looks like

a small stage set. Being so close to the Tate Modern perhaps it's a piece of installation art, but

if it is nobody's bought it or even owned up to it. Perhaps it is a small stage prop, for a nightly

performance of... what? Moby Dick? Billy Budd?, a very low-budget one-man Titanic? (There

are no stage lights, so it's probably not that.) No, probably just an eccentric Englishman's idea

of a joke.

I'll never know now, but one would have thought that the value of the real estate it's sitting on

would have seen this half-boat removed years ago and the corner plot now sporting an outlet

for more tourist dross of the sort that disfigures much else in this area (though I'd be the last

to deny any visitor to London his or her share of the delights of the South Bank, including the

Globe Theatre, the Festival Hall complex, the Tate, the old Clink jail, and much more). Where

this was once the site of the 'Stews of London' it's now its most entertaining and agreeable

playground.