Two arty bouncy castles
Jeremy Deller’s Sacrilege (2012).
Grown men aren’t really allowed on bouncy castles – unless they’re arty ones. In 2012 artist Jeremy Deller toured the UK with the “most stupid artwork” (his words) – a lifesize, inflatable replica of Stonehenge called Sacrilege. Stupid? More like genius, and a lot of fun. The country was on a high that year, with the London 2012 Summer Olympics and when I bounced on Stonehenge, in Burgess Park in Southwark, London with my daughter, it was a (mostly) sunny day. Everyone on it was laughing. And it was free! And one of the main reasons it was so fun, perhaps, was because the acual one is off limits.
In 2019 French artist Camille Walala created an inflatable castle in her signature bright, bold colour palette behind Liverpool Street station. Unfortunately it didn’t have an inflatable base so it wasn’t technically a bouncy castle but it was still pretty cool. The idea was for city workers to de-stress by touching and squeezing the giant shapes.
Camille Walala’s inflatable castle, 2019.
My only complaint is: why aren’t there more artists doing bouncy castles? A giant Tracey Emin unmade bed? Well, maybe not…