Year 2101 - Alban Low - #smallworldfutures

Alban Low, Weston Street, London Bridge, UK (#unsettledgallery No.1)

Small World Futures is a collection of 38 miniature sculptures depicting what life could look like in years to come. Each of these small artworks will be placed in public spaces (#unsettledgallery) around London Bridge. Every day throughout February we will be featuring one of these worlds here on the website. A writer will also use the world as inspiration to create something new and fresh, their words describing the shape of a new world.

Today we discover the Small World Future of....Alban Low
The year is 2101

Wheeze

It started with The Burning Of The Tower. A new way of being seemed possible. They told us they were sorry. Many of them meant it. They told us, ‘Change Will Happen’.

Our external world had always been Kindness v Money. And Money had always won. Because within each of us the battle is between Need and Desire. And Desire had always won. Night is always stronger than Day. Or was.

After The Burning Of The Tower, for a while we were breathing loud and wheezy, but we were breathing with possibility.

They tried at first to close the gaps, patch up the wounds, cover our mouths, fill the lung-holes with bullshit and Strictly and post-post-truth and my-identity-is-more-important-than-yours and splitting and spitting and hate.

Yet they could never fool us completely. And as we began to learn how to ignore them, we began to rebuild. First, the government went. Then all governments went. Then we set about looking at our darknesses, holding them out to others, holding them *for* others. The cladding was stripped away. We could be who we were, hiding neither our black nor our white.

Soon, we were raw and hurt and joyous and unbound. Many died. A God came, a Saviour. Then another and another. Some fell under their spell. But others - the majority - started to regain their curiosity, their love of truth, their open-aired doubt, their willingness to say, ‘I don’t know.’

Corporations began to slice themselves into small pieces, to turn towards communities, to sink themselves gently back into the people. And the people were happy. Most of them. Or - rather - most people were accepting, more whole, more aware, no longer striving for happiness or avoidant of pain. The new century, we agreed, would be a great one.

And then - in 2101 - came The Second Burning Of The Tower.

Kevin Acott

Alban Low

You can find Alban Low's Small World Future on the concrete barriers where Weston Street meets St Thomas Street (London Bridge) at #unsettledgallery No.1. If you can find it then you can take it home, or perhaps you will leave it for someone else to discover.

Alban Low is involved in many creative projects, these include album artwork, publishing chapbooks, making films, maps, conceptual exhibitions, live performance and good old drawing. He is artist-in-residence at the School of Nursing, Faculty of Health, Social Care and Education at Kingston University and St George's University of London. Low spends his evenings in the jazz clubs of London where he captures the exhilaration of live performances in his sketchbook. On Wednesday evenings he sketches the performers on the radio show A World in London at Resonance FM. He is about to open an exhibition of these drawings at the Yehudi Menuhin Concert Hall on the 14th February 2018.

http://albanlow.com/

Kevin Acott

Kevin Acott is a London-based model, cult singer and poet. He divides his creative time between writing, photography and collaborative projects. His stories and poems can be found on the websites Sad Paradise, Londonist, Smoke: A London Peculiar and Ink, Sweat And Tears. In 2017 he dedicated six months to travelling and writing. Starting in North Carolina (USA) he eventually ended his adventures in Limoux, France. Along the way Acott spent a month as writer-in-residence in Qaqortoq (Greenland) where he wrote several short stories. He has released several books with publisher Sampson Low and is currently working toward a one-man show at this year's Crouch End Festival in June 2018.
www.kevinacott.com