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Arrivals + Departures
Exhibition
Arrivals + Departures
10 Sep 2020 – 10 Oct 2020
Regular hours
- Thursday
- 11:00 – 20:00
- Friday
- 11:00 – 20:00
- Saturday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Sunday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Monday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Tuesday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Wednesday
- 11:00 – 20:00
Address
- Strand
- WC2R 1LA
- London
- WC2R 1LA
- United Kingdom
Travel Information
- 6, 9, 11, 13, 15, 23, 77a, 91 and 176, while the River Bus Service can be taken to Embankment and Savoy Piers.
- Temple, Covent Garden, Charing Cross and Embankment.
- Charing Cross, Waterloo and Blackfriars.
Situated in our spectacular courtyard, Arrivals + Departures is a large-scale interactive installation exploring birth, death and the journey in between by artist duo YARA + DAVINA.
About
Taking the recognisable form of a station or airport arrivals and departures board, the artwork invites visitors to share the names of people who have arrived and departed as a way to celebrate a birth or commemorate a death. As the effects of COVID-19, racial injustice and the environmental crisis continue to disrupt communities across the world, this artwork offers a timely platform to engage with birth, life, death, loss and collective grief, through the act of naming.
The interactive installation also honours the heritage of Somerset House itself, which was formerly home to the General Registrar of Births, Marriages and Deaths, holding the first comprehensive record of life events for the whole of the population for many generations.
Each Wednesday (16 Sep - 7 Oct), the artist duo invite a specialist to takeover the installation both in real time and on Somerset House Instagram Stories, exploring themes of Birth; including lockdown births, environmental justice, grief, and race and social justice.
