Latest news with #ThePerimeter
Time Out
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time Out
Alexandra Metcalf at The Perimeter
Walking through the high-ceilinged halls of The Perimeter in Bloomsbury, where natural light spills across bare walls and polished floors, you might not expect to stumble across something so disturbing and intimate. Gaaaaaaasp is London-born artist Alexandra Metcalf's first solo institutional exhibition, turning the gallery's four floors into a disorienting world of 1960s patterns and clinical sterility, brought together under themes of domestic and gendered labour. In the first room, the ceiling drops oppressively low beneath the flicker of harsh office lights. The walls are covered in 1970s vintage wallpaper; a dull, yellowed floral that seems steeped in years of cigarette smoke. The carpet is a muted, corporate grey-blue and chairs line the edges of the room. A muffled dialogue loops continuously from a TV screen mounted high in the corner, playing recordings from the artist's own visits to abortion clinics and therapy sessions over the years. The space recalls a clinical waiting area, but it also suggests something more metaphysical: a kind of purgatory, where time is suspended, judgment is quietly present and trauma lingers. In Gaaaaaaasp, the domestic is destabilised. On the top floor, an open trunk has enormous needles piercing its lining like weapons. Another room is configured as a hospital unit, with two 1960s nightstands with bed springs erupting from vintage trunks lit by collapsing surgical lights. The floor is covered in faded pink linoleum, the colour of a pediatric ward or nursery; except here, the hues tip into psychedelia, turning the space into something dissociative and quietly menacing. Meanwhile, a standout painting, I AM MY OWN RIOT & BEST FRIEND (2025), stretches five metres across one gallery wall: a densely layered work with paper cut-outs sealed with wax and female figures in ambiguous poses. What makes Gaaaaaaasp so powerful is its excavation of the long, gendered history of psychiatric containment. In Victorian Britain, women were routinely institutionalised for hysteria and postnatal depression; their lives confined to a world of needlework, ornament and quiet suffering. Metcalf's environments echo this. Her use of marbling, stitching and soft furnishings reference these sanctioned forms of feminine expression, while also exposing their limitations. These were the materials women were allowed to work with, even as their bodies and minds were surveilled and controlled. Yet within these constraints, Metcalf finds rebellion. Her camp aesthetic, theatrical excess and jarring use of colour transform repression into performance. The show's title lands somewhere between a scream and a laugh: a bodily release that is at once absurd, tragic and liberating. This exhibition feels acutely timely. As conversations around bodily autonomy, particularly abortion rights and mental health, are especially politically charged, Gaaaaaaasp reminds us that these debates are not new. They are part of a much longer history of how women's bodies have been monitored and medicalised.
Scottish Sun
15-05-2025
- Scottish Sun
‘I walked the UK coast for five years – this little-known beach felt like the Bahamas'
Plus, the award-winning Welsh beach perfect for the summer holidays that won't be busy BEACH BEAUTY 'I walked the UK coast for five years – this little-known beach felt like the Bahamas' Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) IF ONE person knows where you can find the best beaches in the UK, it's Quintin Lake. For his new book The Perimeter, Quintin travelled for five years around the entire coastline of mainland Britain which covered 6800 miles and he was armed with nothing but hiking gear and a camera. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 5 Quintin walked on and off for five years taking pictures of the UK coastline and found incredible beaches Credit: Quintin Lake 5 Some of the beaches look like they belong in other countries - like Achmelvich Bay in Lochinver Credit: Quintin Lake Photographer Quintin travelled through Wales, up to Scotland and across England, finding beautiful coastal spots and he took 1,300 pictures. Along the way, Quintin saw all sorts, including beaches that you wouldn't believe were in the UK - and one that looked like it was in the Caribbean, was actually in Scotland. Quintin told Sun Travel: "Achmelvich Bay in Scotland literally looks like it belongs being in the Bahamas because the sand is white. "The sea looks turquoise, which you'll see in the book. The water is a beautiful greeny blue - it doesn't look like it belongs in this country at all. "When I went, it was a sunny day and there were maybe six people there so it was heaven. I couldn't believe it. "All the northwestern and Sutherland beaches have white sand, and if you go off the beaten path you can easily find a hidden bay that you'll have all to yourself." Quintin isn't the only one to recognise Achmelvich Bay for its tropical beauty, in 2023, the beach was recognised as being one of the World's Best Beaches. It came in at number 45, and is the only UK beach to ever be placed in the top 50. Scotland doesn't just have beautiful beaches, it's also known for its very striking landscape. "Faraid Head in Scotland is beautiful too, especially with the dramatic cliffs that come down to the sea." UK beach named one of the top 100 in the world 5 Scottish beaches also have dramatic coastlines like on Faraid Head in Durness Credit: Quintin Lake 5 The journey took a total of five years and Quintin wild camped along the way Credit: Quintin Lake He continued: "Then on the Ardnamurchan Peninsula in Scotland there's a single road where you'll come to a volcano from thousands of years ago. "The top has blown off and you wouldn't even believe it's in Britain, the beach is so remote and eagles fly overhead - it's very dramatic." Quintin added: "I mean in northwest Scotland, it's really easy to find a beach where there's no one there for days on end." Applecross Beach in Scotland is a remote sandy stretch that visitors have sometimes referred to as being the 'edge of the world'. The area is known for its wild and untamed landscape, with rugged mountains, lochs, and beaches. A recommendation from Quintin for any holidaymakers who want to avoid beach crowds this summer is Three Cliffs Bay in Wales. The beach is on the Gower Peninsula and spans for 0.6 miles in low tide. In 2023, Three Cliffs Bay came ninth in Big Seven Travel's 50 Most Beautiful Places in the UK. Quintin added: "It's just beautiful, I mean, if you're from Wales, it's probably quite well-known but that beach was magical and it's huge. "It would be great for families because it's not one of those places where everyone's on top of each other all the time." Quintin's book, The Perimeter is out now and available to buy here.
The Irish Sun
15-05-2025
- The Irish Sun
‘I walked the UK coast for five years – this little-known beach felt like the Bahamas'
IF ONE person knows where you can find the best beaches in the UK, it's Quintin Lake. For his new book 5 Quintin walked on and off for five years taking pictures of the UK coastline and found incredible beaches Credit: Quintin Lake 5 Some of the beaches look like they belong in other countries - like Achmelvich Bay in Lochinver Credit: Quintin Lake Photographer Quintin travelled through Wales, up to Scotland and across England, finding beautiful coastal spots and he took 1,300 pictures. Along the way, Quintin saw all sorts, including beaches that you wouldn't believe were in the UK - and one that looked like it was in the Caribbean, was actually in Scotland. Quintin told Sun Travel: " "The sea looks turquoise, which you'll see in the book. The water is a beautiful greeny blue - it doesn't look like it belongs in this country at all. "When I went, it was a sunny day and there were maybe six people there so it was heaven. I couldn't believe it. "All the northwestern and Sutherland beaches have white sand, and if you go off the beaten path you can easily find a hidden bay that you'll have all to yourself." Quintin isn't the only one to recognise It came in at number 45, and is the only UK beach to ever be placed in the top 50. Most read in Beach holidays Scotland doesn't just have beautiful beaches, it's also known for its very striking landscape. "Faraid Head in Scotland is beautiful too, especially with the dramatic cliffs that come down to the sea." UK beach named one of the top 100 in the world 5 Scottish beaches also have dramatic coastlines like on Faraid Head in Durness Credit: Quintin Lake 5 The journey took a total of five years and Quintin wild camped along the way Credit: Quintin Lake He continued: "Then on the "The top has blown off and you wouldn't even believe it's in Britain, the beach is so remote and eagles fly overhead - it's very dramatic." Quintin added: "I mean in northwest Scotland, it's really easy to find a beach where there's no one there for days on end." Applecross Beach in Scotland is a remote sandy stretch that visitors have sometimes referred to as being the 'edge of the world'. The area is known for its wild and untamed landscape, with rugged mountains, lochs, and beaches. A recommendation from Quintin for any holidaymakers who want to avoid beach crowds this summer is The beach is on the Gower Peninsula and spans for 0.6 miles in low tide. In 2023, Quintin added: "It's just beautiful, I mean, if you're from Wales, it's probably quite well-known but that beach was magical and it's huge. Read more on the Irish Sun "It would be great for families because it's not one of those places where everyone's on top of each other all the time." Quintin's book, The Perimeter is out now and available to buy 5 Quintin has documented his journey in The Perimeter Credit: Quintin Lake
BBC News
11-05-2025
- BBC News
Photographer walks entire British mainland coastline for book
A photographer has published a book documenting a 6,835 mile (11,000km) walk around the entire coastline of mainland Lake, from Cheltenham, walked the route in chunks over five years, having first set off from the steps of St Paul's Cathedral on 17 April journey took a total of 454 days, with Mr Lake taking 130,000 pictures on the journey for his book The Perimeter."Unless there was barbed wire, I really did walk the lot," he said. "There's no right or wrong way to do it but I was very particular in how close I kept to the edge." Mr Lake has previously undertaken other long walks, documenting the source of the River Thames to London, and photographing the length of the River Severn."Once I covered 1,000 miles (1,609km) it was quite hard to stop," he said."Scotland was a completely different endeavour - there was a lot of trial and error following the mountain ridges, and large parts were overgrown so there was a lot of backtracking, and it was exhausting physically."In the winter you don't see people for four or five days, and the days are very short as well." Mr Lake broke two walking poles on the journey and suffered a torn tendon that laid him up for two months on the journey."One night on a steep path I slipped, and my pole stopped me from falling down a cliff."In Holderness in Yorkshire where the coast erodes five to seven metres a year, I didn't realise that and I got stuck below the cliffs as the tide came up, that was quite terrifying. "The constant thing was dealing with cold and wet when you're by yourself in a tent. "I had one dry set of clothes, but in the morning putting wet cold clothes on in the morning was the worst part," he said. It took Mr Lake three years to edit the pictures and a further 14 months to produce the book."When you walk you make your own luck as a photographer, but you meet really interesting people and that's what makes adventuring with a camera fascinating," he said.
Middle East Eye
08-04-2025
- Politics
- Middle East Eye
Israeli soldiers detail orders to 'annihilate' Gaza land for buffer zone
Israeli troops were given orders to raze agricultural land, destroy residential blocks and open fire on anyone who came near them to make way for deadly buffer zones in Gaza, a report by Israeli veterans' group Breaking the Silence (BtS) has revealed. According to Israeli soldiers interviewed for the report, titled "The Perimeter", the army created a perimeter, between 800 and 1500 metres in breadth and 1.5km inside the Gaza Strip, where "large swathes of the land were turned into massive kill zones". The soldiers said that the borders of such areas were invisible, constantly changing and were not communicated to Palestinians. "At first, the IDF (Israeli army) designated a certain area that was forbidden to cross. The IDF decides on a certain line, and conceptually, anyone who crosses it is considered a threat," one reserve commander testified. "It happened at the Netzarim Corridor and it happened on the border, too. There are no clear rules of engagement. There is some room for discretion on the ground. Like, ultimately, it's down to the company commander and the battalion commander." New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters The Netzarim Corridor, a six-kilometre stretch of land south of Gaza City that divides the strip into its northern and southern parts, is used by Israeli forces to monitor and control the movement of Palestinians between northern and southern Gaza and to launch military operations. 'Anyone who crosses a certain line, that we have defined, is considered a threat and is sentenced to death' - Israeli soldier in Gaza In December, a Haaretz investigation revealed that hundreds of Palestinians, including children, had been indiscriminately shot dead by Israeli soldiers along the corridor. It had been designated as a 'kill zone' by the Division 252 commander, according to a senior officer, allowing soldiers to shoot 'anyone who enters". "There is no proper combat procedure like there is in Judea and Samaria [West Bank]. Company commanders make all kinds of decisions about this, so it ultimately very much depends on who they are. But there is no system of accountability in general," the Israeli reserve commander told BtS. "Anyone who crosses a certain line, that we have defined, is considered a threat and is sentenced to death. That did exist. It was an IDF definition. There was a line." A land without rules The testimonies given to Breaking the Silence reveal the orders soldiers received to conduct missions searching for corpses and the razing of vast stretches of Gaza. "Within the Perimeter, the IDF created a vast expanse where rules of engagement were seemingly nonexistent and civilian homes were methodically destroyed en masse, alongside infrastructure and agriculture critical to Gaza's future self-sufficiency and rehabilitation," BtS reported. Israel has been accused of forcibly razing Gaza's border areas ever since the early months of the war, with the UN high commissioner for human rights saying these acts may constitute war crimes in February last year. According to Breaking the Silence, buffer zones are a fundemental part of Israel's defence strategy, with the current zones in Gaza established after "wholesale destruction", entirely reshaping around 16 percent of Gaza. Amnesty says the mass devastation of buildings and agricultural lands along the eastern boundaries amount to collective punishment of Palestinian civilians, even if civilian property may have been used by armed groups in the past. In its report, Breaking the Silence notes that the creation of such a perimeter isolates Gaza and ensures Israel has "absolute military control over the area". Rage and clarity as Palestinians detail devastation in northern Gaza Read More » Soldiers testified that certain areas were divided into sections called "polygons", where they were given instructions to systematically dismantle and ravage them using bulldozers, mines and explosives. "Basically, our main mission was blowing things up, I'm talking up to hundreds of structure units (buildings). It's not like the high rises in Shati (refugee camp in Gaza City). It's one-storey or two-storey cubes. But the destruction is total," an Israeli sergeant major operating in Khan Younis said. He added that the logic behind mass destruction and erasure of infrastructure was to "create flat lines of observation and fire." "There's a map that the Gaza Division made of polygons along the Strip fence that are marked in green, yellow, orange, and red," the sergeant major explained. "Green means that more than 80 percent of the buildings were taken down - residential buildings, greenhouses, sheds, factories; you name it - it needs to be flat. That's the order. "There are no structures, except for that Unrwa school and that small water facility - for everything else, the directive was 'nothing left.'" Dismantling Palestinian self-sufficiency The report also outlines how Israel sought to destroy Palestinian self-sufficiency in food production with the army razing "around 35 percent of all agriculture in the Gaza Strip". "This crippled Gaza's self-sufficiency by increasing its reliance on food entering from IDF-controlled crossings, sabotaging any future attempt at rebuilding sustainably," the report added. 'All of them were wiped off the face of the earth. Annihilation, expropriation, and expulsion are immoral and must never be normalised' - Breaking the Silence report "Industrial zones and agricultural areas which served the entire population of Gaza were laid to waste, regardless of whether those areas had any connection whatsoever to the fighting." According to a former reserves first sergeant in the 5th Brigade, areas in Gaza's boundaries were razed, and completely demolished, even if they were residential blocks or agricultural land. "What you do is bite off a kilometre west along the strip, from the fence inward. Essentially create a sterile strip - where there once used to be fields, groves, all kinds of things - nothing, sterile," he said. "Fields or groves before. After - sand, dunes, destruction. It really didn't surprise me, it was clear to me that this is what's going on, that we're going to take a bite out of the [Gaza] Strip." Another soldier said that large excavators were used in fields, taking out the soil and growth in the area. "Achzariot [armoured personnel carrier] and tanks provide security, and the D9 [armoured bull dozer] just mows down everything within a certain square, and then you move on northwards," the solider said. The D9 destroyed "mainly fields, agriculture, olive trees, eggplant fields. A very large excavator just comes through and takes out all the soil, kind of rolls it up, flattens it. It was a shame, great agriculture, beautiful eggplants and beautiful cauliflowers." The report noted that the creation of the perimeter and enforcing heavy military control led to the annihilation of over "3,500 buildings, as well as industrial and agricultural areas which are critical for the fabric of life in the Gaza Strip". "All of them were wiped off the face of the earth. Annihilation, expropriation, and expulsion are immoral and must never be normalised or legitimised," the report said.
