July 27, 2012

The Olympic Bells

As I’ve often mentioned, one of the things I loved about living in the UK was the sense of unity. All you have to do is look back a few weeks to the Jubilee Beacons Lighting.beacons

By the time you read this (in most cases), another one of these unifying events will have taken place. It’s a project called Work 1197 – All the Bells.image At exactly 8:12, BST, Big Ben will start ringing, followed by bells all over the UK in celebration of the arrival of the 2012 Summer Olympics. Each church will ring bells. Each town and village will ring bells. All of the bells in the country will be rung as loudly and as quickly as possible for three minutes. It’s a piece of performance art by Turner Prize-winning artist, Martin Creed. imageIt’s a piece of classic British celebration. Everyone takes part, everyone joins in. I have my alarm set for 3:12 EST to ring a little silver bell.

3 comments:

  1. I remember during the 1980s when my son was about four years old or so, there was some event commemorated by a simultaneous bell ringing. We drove downtown to hear all the old church bells ring. The gentleman ringing the bell, at the church where my son attended pre-school, alowed my son to ring the bell. I have a photo somewhere. This is before flicker piccasa and clouds . Anyway, I googled simultaneous bell ringing and the item regarding JFK's desire to have a simultaneous bell ringing for the Fourth of July was noted. Perhaps some patriotic soul should awaken the country of this effort hmmm do you know of anyone one hey someone with a blog a blog that is read by many we could warm up with this event What you say?? B. Ross

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  2. What fun! If only I could get everyone in my town to ring bells simultaneously at 6 AM, perhaps I wouldn't sleep through my alarm... ;-) Posts like this give me a travel itch, you know. I have a hankering for old town squares and clock towers now.

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  3. I agree great idea, performance, etc. I loved QE11's entrance into the stadium.

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