Bompas & Parr are a fabulous London-based jelly first.
That description doesn’t begin to do them justice. I first encountered them setting a foot-tall replica in jelly of St Paul’s cathedral on fire in memory of the Great Fire of London. They built a rowable green lake on top of Selfridges. They do cocktails of various imaginative varieties, such as the walk-in G&T the other year.
On March 21st, they’re doing a science fiction cocktail event in London:
For A Culinary Odyssey Bompas & Parr is working with KitchenAid to look at the food of the future through prototyping the dishes of science fiction. The event on the 21st March opens fresh areas for culinary speculation and food ethics by examining the physical, biological and astronomical possibilities of cocktails and canapés.
The Experimental Cocktail Club (ECC) is making science fiction cocktails including Burgess’s terrifying Milk Plus, Rhea Thierstein is designing sets that include the entire solar system in papier-mâché, Poietic Studio is building a food levitation device and tropism well and Andrew Stellitano is developing a menu that includes genetic modification, entomophagy, and nano-technology On the evening, Future Laboratory will launch a report on science fiction prototyping and food preparation in the future.
The evening celebrates the launch of the KitchenAid’s 6.9L Artisan stand mixer and is proving pretty popular. The first batch of tickets went in a flash when they eventually went on sale last Thursday. We are planning to release more on the 19th March at noon from our website.
If you can get hold of a ticket you’ll be able to experience ECC’s take on the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster described by Douglas Adams as ‘the alcoholic equivalent of a mugging’ the effects of which are like ‘having your brain smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick’.
It’s currently sold out, but a second tranche of tickets goes on sale at noon on March 19th. Be ready to pounce if this interests you.
Also in London, ongoing, is second-hand science fiction retail as art. It’s been open for at least a few weeks now, so some of you may have caught artist Heman Chong’s conversion of gallery Rossi & Rossi into a temporary retail shop selling sf novels.
The artist is an avid S&F fan and has read most of these books in research for his own Sci-Fi novel set to be released next year. Heman has a long, impressive CV featuring exhibitions at The Frieze Art Fair (2011) and representing Singapore at the Venice Biennale (2003), among other highlights (http://www.rossirossi.com/contemporary/artists/heman-chong/cv). This current work explores the relationship between objects and contexts, where the gallery space oscillates between a bookstore and an artwork depending on who comes in, why they came, and how they view and interact with it. Essentially, each visitor becomes a part of, and potentially transforms the peice. We’ve had hundreds of S&F fans come and we want to invite you and your members/fans to come and enjoy the exhibit. The bottom line: thousands of S&F classics for only £1 each.
The exhibit is open Mon-Fri, 10am-6pm; Sat, 11am-4pm. Rossi and Rossi is at 16 Clifford Street, Mayfair, W1S 3RG. Nearest station, Green Park.
Based on the gallery website, his paintings of the book covers are also for sale. The installation is on until March 30th.
See also London Calling’s interview with the artist for more information on him and his work.
vector-bsfa.com 