Where Light Falls Audio Description for Sight Impaired Visitors: Site 2 (Front Façade)
Transcript
You are standing outside the front façade of St Paul’s Cathedral.
The front of St Paul’s cathedral is shrouded in darkness.
From out of the darkness, the front cover of a red, leather bound book covers the whole of the façade of the cathedral. It is the cover of the log book, the inspiration for the poet Keith Jarrett. St Paul’s watch members filled in the log book as they patrolled the building, watching for falling bombs. Every patrol, bombing, and act of bravery was recorded in this book and it’s now part of St Paul’s Cathedral archives.
The words “From the Log Book” appear in gold lettering in the middle of the book’s cover.
The cover opens to reveal aged pages, with handwritten notes in black ink. The pages turn, slowly at first, speeding up until they disappear leaving St Paul’s in darkness once more.
Against a black background, white sparks start to emerge and dance across the front of the building. White smoke with tinges of red billows across the scene. It quickly disappears and the silhouette of bombed buildings emerges.
Behind the silhouette there is an archive black and white photograph of St Paul’s standing proud on the horizon.
Orange sparks start to spit from the silhouette. It builds to an orange and red glow.
The scene suddenly disappears, as if has been melted away. In its place are black and white archive images against handwritten notes from the log book. The profile of a man’s head, wearing a tin helmet, is silhouetted against a picture of the dome of St Paul’s. A black and white photograph of a member of the St Paul’s watch appears, he looks out to the horizon, scanning the sky for planes.
The images seem to burn away and in their place is an archive photograph of two members of St Paul’s watch , practicing a fire drill with hosepipe in hand. Next to them, a woman in glasses, wearing wartime uniform looks out to the middle distance. Smoke and sparks swirl around the images.
The scene changes to an aerial view of a Second World War map of the City of London. Bomber planes fly overhead. Clouds of purple smoke drop from the planes, to suggest bombs, and land on to the map below, colouring sections to represent bomb damage.
The map disappears to reveal more black and white archive photography. A bus, burnt out and half submerged in a bomb crater, is pictured next to a shot of the inside of the bomb damaged St Paul’s. The picture shows a crater, made by an incendiary device that fell on to the North Transept of the cathedral. There are piles of rubble and chairs, set out for a religious service, are scattered across the floor.
Dust, as if from the impact of an explosion, appears to fall over both images.
Further black and white photographs appear. On a London street, fire fighters douse the flames that consume whole buildings.
This transforms into flashes of more archive imagery, of rubble and bomb blasts. St Paul’s Cathedral stands among neighbouring buildings that are now reduced to rubble.
The scene changes again, this time it is a black and white archive image of two men surveying the damage to a bombed out roof where is this?
The façade falls into darkness again. This time, orange sparks fly across the building.
A black and white photograph of the wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill emerges from the darkness as hand written notes from the log book appear. Sparks continue to fly.
A photograph of Churchill visiting a bomb damaged site with his advisors emerges. The imagery is shaking, as if being projected using old film.
Smoke billows across the scene and in its wake, black and white photographs of members of St Paul’s watch appear. They are wearing tin helmets and carry gas masks. Two men practice putting out fires with a hose pipe.
Handwritten notes from the log book and red and white smoke surround the figures.
They are replaced by a milkman, dressed in a white coat, smiling to the camera. Next to him, a line of men, dressed in St Paul’s watch uniform are grinning for a photograph. They are against a backdrop of silhouetted buildings, destroyed by bombs.
The scene changes to a black and white photograph showing people clearing rubble from a bombed house. Two women stand with their backs to us, looking at the damage. One, an air raid warden puts her arm around the other woman to comfort her. The image is flickering and incomplete.
This image disappears to reveal more pictures of the St Paul’s watch, surrounded by smoke and an orange glow. In the middle of the scene, a civilian woman carrying her belongings, looks down at the ground.
As more dust falls over the scene, it transforms into black and white imagery of Londoners sheltering in a tube station. People are packed in tightly, even lying on the tracks so there is room. They are smiling for the camera, and one woman is busying herself knitting.
Another image shows young men playing cards, to pass the time. Sparks start to spread across the photographs.
A new set of black and white images appear. This time of children in small cots are tucked up for bed in the shelter. More handwritten notes from the log book emerge next to them.
The scene changes to black and white imagery of people sleeping in tube stations. People are sleeping on the escalators and stairs leading down to the underground as bombs fall overhead. A picture of a woman and a man in a crowded bomb shelter appears. They are both laughing as she pours beer in to a tea cup for him.
Orange sparks appear and burn away the image. An architectural drawing of St Paul’s appears, next to archive photographs of watch members practising drills. White smoke travels across the scene.
Against a backdrop of ruined buildings, bathed in an orange and red glow, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, appear alongside photographs of the St Paul’s watch members.
The image melts away to reveal watch members practicing drills as ruined buildings emerge in the background. Handwritten notes from the log book appear.
The scene changes to black and white shots of St Paul’s among the rubble as notes from the log book continue to be written out across the images. Black smoke and orange sparks obscure parts of the photographs.
More black smoke billows across the scene and in its wake an aerial view of the river Thames emerges. The aerial photograph is coloured in shades of blue, and the Thames is an inky black. Dark grey bomber planes fly overhead.
The image transforms into the pages of the log book once more. Aged pages, covered in black handwriting, start to turn. As sparks fly across the scene, the pages of the log book shut.
St Paul’s is dark once more, apart from orange sparks that fly about. The sparks fade and in their place, small strands of fireweed – the plant that grew among the rubble of bomb sites after the blitz– start to appear.
The strands of fireweed, a symbol of hope and recovery, start to slowly climb their way up the building, covering every inch of the façade until the entire cathedral is transformed into a living mass of green leaves and pink flowers.
The projections come to an end and the following credits appear:
Thank you to the people who saved St Paul’s Cathedral for future generations.
Where Light Falls: A commission by Historic England
Projections by Double Take Projections
Poetry by Keith Jarrett
With thanks to The Poetry Society and everyone who helped create From the Log Book
Archbishop Tenison’s School
Eastbrook School
George Green’s School
Lady Margaret School
Exiled Writers Ink
Claremont Project
In partnership with: City of London Corporation as part of its Fantastic Feats season of outdoor arts events and St Paul’s Cathedral.
All images courtesy
Historic England Archive
Imperial War Museum
London Metropolitan Archive
St Paul’s Cathedral Archive
@HistoricEngland #WhereLightFalls
Audio descriptions for other sites at St Paul's Cathedral
- Scene setting and instructions
- Site 1: South
- Site 2: Front façade (current page)
- Site 3: North
