When I found out that I was able to exhibit at the Control Tower I was surprised how pleased and excited I felt. It is a wonderful location to show some art and the views are superb. However, there was something else that I didn't at first appreciate. I liked the idea that it was precisely here that someone would monitor and manage the operations of a facility that had the potential to wipe out half a continent and that this apocalyptic capability is now removed and consigned to history (here at least) but this still didn't quite explain my initial reaction. The chosen title for the exhibition (thanks, by the way, to Not the Nine o'Clock News) seemed amusing and ironic when it was chosen but I have been wondering whether it may be apposite in some other way.
Last year I had my own superpower confrontation with an ensuing standoff that could have gone either way. It is about a mile from my house up to the Common; a mile that I can walk or cycle very easily now but not last year. On the first occasion I again attempted the journey on foot, while trudging across the sloping Audrey's Meadow, I had a sudden, unexpected sensation of energy flowing up from the earth, coursing through my body and up into the sky. At the same time I was aware of the enormous, overwhelming physical mass of the hill and the plateau of the Common spread out in front of me. For what was probably only a few seconds I stood amazed and only slightly concerned that I might be suffering some kind of seizure.
...and here we are: What you see in the exhibition is some record of the energy, space, light and sheer, glorious existence of some of the places that I longed to see then and that I treasure now. There are some superpowers in this world that I hope will never be consigned to history.