Got stuck in a lift yesterday. A lift in a cube. A white cube. Have
never been stuck in a lift before, ever, so it had to be in the White Cube Gallery in St.James, Piccadilly.
After looking at the few Wayne Thiebaud paintings parsimoniously spaced on the white cubish walls of
the upper gallery and been disappointed (they're better in
reproduction) I decided, foolishly, to take the lift rather than stairs
to the rest of the show in the cube's basement.
Pushed the appropriate
going-down buttons and waited. And waited. And waited and waited again
and again but no doors opened. I'm not the panicky type and not
particularly claustrophobic but this was beginning to worry me.
A barely
visible bell icon on one of the silver buttons indicated it was an
alarm. I pressed it. It was a telephone. After several rings a languid
voice spoke. Asked me to state the address I was speaking from. Whaddya
mean the fucking address I didn't say. I said, sternly, that I was
trapped in the lift at the White Cube Gallery and the fucking door
wasn't opening. I didn't say fucking door, just door. The voice asked
again for the address and this time I must admit I shouted. I shouted
that all they had to do was talk to the receptionist on the other side
of this fucking lift.
Finally the door opened and the surprised
receptionist, cubishly cool, calm and collected, said "I never heard
you". She turned to a visitor and asked "Did you hear anything?" The
visitor shrugged. I emerged from the lift and exited the Cube, fuming.
Never saw the rest of Wayne Thiebaud's pies and ice cream cones.
On my
way home on the tube, a woman coughed in my face.
It was one of those days.
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