Elephant & Castle Odyssey

On Sunday we had a storytelling procession around Elephant & Castle roundabout. The event was a celebration of Eva Sajovic and Sarah Butler’s residency at The Cuming Museum, and the theme was ‘Home’. Artist Rebecca Davies created a shrine of the home to carry around with us. We’d all placed things representing our homes on it – plus it was adorned with plenty of fabric flowers, Tunnocks Teacakes and Wagon Wheels.

Anyone who knows the E&C shopping centre will know that the 1970s Arndale ambiance lends itself seamlessly to the story of Homer’s Odyssey.

So we went on our very own Odyssey of the imagination, over the metal mountain that is the Faraday memorial substation, deep into the dark, piss-stained Underworld and round to the deserted heights of the Heygate Estate.

We stopped off at various points to tell parts of the story and contribute our own thoughts on the subject of ‘Home’. Here you can see some local children have drifted over to listen. I’d reached the point in the story where I would offer the audience something to eat from the shrine. No sooner had the words left my lips, then the children dived onto the shrine and started hastily filling their pockets with Wagon Wheels.