Coinciding with the 300th anniversary of the opening of Berwick Barracks, Tim Etchells installation Wait Here (Double Line) comprises of a new version of Etchells’ 2008 neon work, the full text for which reads ‘Wait Here I Have Gone to Get Help’.
Visible above the gatehouse entrance of the town’s former military barracks, Etchells’ work makes a playful intervention into the site invoking an imaginary situation of peril and a fictitious mission to gather support. Long a home for troops on call for missions further North or abroad – the Barracks is recast by Etchells as the location for another kind of story about danger and the need for caution or defence.
“It’s always an interesting to make work specially for a particular site. In the case of the Berwick Barracks I was thinking about its origin as part of a defensive outpost, and the way it resonates with narratives of danger, attack and defence. I wanted something that would resonate strongly with the situation and the phrase used in Wait Here seemed to open lots of possible interpretations, serious and comical at the same time.”
Tim EtchellsTim Etchells (b. 1962, Stevenage, UK) has produced major commissions for public space internationally including; ‘With/Against’, Great Exhibition of The North and BALTIC, Gateshead; ‘Different Today’, SITE Gallery, Sheffield; his poster project ‘And For The Rest’ created and presented in: Brussels (2014), Basel (2015), and Athens (2016); ‘Vacuum Days (Utrecht)’ (2016); and ’Eyes Looking’ a video installation which took over Times Square, NYC, commissioned as part of Times Square Arts Alliance ‘Midnight Moments’ series (2016).
Wait Here (Double Line), 2021 was commissioned by Berwick Visual Arts in partnership with English Heritage and supported by Berwick Welcome Visitor Project.