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Rachael, Caroline and Maya in Block D, Bletchley Park. Photograph by Rachael Marshall.
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- The Station X exhibition is no longer at Bletchley Park.
Station X is a collaboration between an installation artist, a photographer, a sound artist and a film maker that documents Blocks C and D at Bletchley Park prior to their renovation.
Bletchley Park is also known as Station X, ‘home of the code-breakers’. Eleven thousand people worked there during World War Two and were sworn to secrecy about their activities for the following 30 years. It is also the birthplace of modern information technology.
The artists documented some of the derelict Grade II listed buildings in which the code-breakers worked, which have always been inaccessible to the public due to their dangerous state of disrepair. Conditions are harsh in rooms that have been unventilated and occupied only by pigeons and rats for years. Some of the buildings give the impression that the workers have just downed tools and left; a rusty old coat hanger swings on a hook with a name scrawled on it and a file of technical information disintegrates on a window sill. Others provide fascinating insights into what happens when nature is left to its own devices for years.
After decades of decay and a successful fundraising campaign the buildings are now being renovated.
Station X provides a sensory insight into the disused buildings and the remnants of their secret past. It offers a contemporary interpretation of what is arguably one of Britain’s most important 20th century historical sites. The exhibition documents the visual and aural histories imbued in the buildings before their renovation.
Caroline Devine is a sound artist who captured the sounds produced by and within the decaying huts. Caroline is interested in voices that may be obscured, silenced or absent such as the employees at Bletchley who were sworn to secrecy for 30 years after the war.
Rachael Marshall is a photographer who is particularly interested in the reasons why we value and preserve certain buildings.
Maya Ramsay is an installation artist who makes works using a process to lift pigment, debris and texture from surfaces in the built environment, in particular from buildings that are due to be demolished or restored. Maya specialises in making works that reference war through the associations that abstract marks can create.
The work of Luke Williams involves film, carving, construction and installation practices. Luke produces devices which co-exist with the space in which they are placed. He is interested in the narratives and reinterpretation of science.
Exhibitions
November 7th 2012 – September 2013 – Hut 8 at Bletchley Park
September 6th to October 6th 2012 – Ghost Station at Bletchley Park
May 3rd to June 1st, 2012 – Milton Keynes Gallery Project Space
