Ghost Station at Bletchley Park

Ghost Station flyer by ArtHertz

Ghost Station is the new exhibition from ArtHertz, staged at Bletchley Park - the home of code breaking during World War II and the birthplace of modern technology. The month long event is part of the Milton Keynes Heritage Open Days - Summer of Culture 2012 and explores themes of codes, code-breaking and messages, Alan Turing, the role of pigeons and women in World War II. The exhibition also explores the ongoing ArtHertz agenda of the analogue / digital distinction. Ghost Station will also include the critically acclaimed collaborative piece, Station X (featured on BBC Radio 4) - an installation that documents the Bletchley buildings with sound, film, photography and surfaces.

Over 20 selected contemporary artists' work will be interspersed amongst the museum's exhibits in Hut 8, the Bombe Hut and Hut 11. The Enigma Cinema at Bletchley will also play host to screenings of short films curated by Rushes Soho Shorts Film Festival and ArtHertz presenting the UK Premiere of Al Croseri's feature length film,The Pigeoneers, Esther Johnson's 'Analogue Kingdom' and 'Tune In'. There will also be a closing party and premiere of the war pigeon short, 'Gustav' by Dennis Da Silva on 30th September.

Station X in Hut 8 at Bletchley Park

The bicycle shed outside Hut 8. Photograph by Rachael Marshall.

The Station X work is returning to the place where it was created: Bletchley Park. We'll be exhibiting in Hut 8, which was refurbished to resemble its wartime layout in 2005 and currently houses displays about leisure time for the codebreakers and the heroic carrier pigeons.

Our work will be part of Ghost Station, an exhibition by a range of artists inspired by codebreakers and the site they worked at in secrecy. More information about Ghost Station can be found here.

Pigeons and an interview with the BBC

Rachael Marshall, Image from Documenting Station X, Blocks C and D I, Ten projected photographs, 2010-2012.

An interview with Caroline, Maya and me has just been published on BBC News Beds, Herts & Bucks.

"They have lifted rust-covered surfaces from walls, recorded the squawking of pigeons and other sounds from inside the decaying buildings, and those that come from outside like the rumble of trains from the nearby West Coast line."

The Pigeon Museum in Hut 8 at Bletchley Park celebrates the wartime contributions of carrier pigeons and displays pigeon boxes, official documents, photographs and a list of the 32 pigeons that received the Dickin Medal. Pigeons were often parachuted to locations in enemy territories with tiny messages in cylinders attached to their legs, and flew back to their lofts carrying a reply. 

World War II Parachute Container. These were used to supply European Resistance Groups with pigeon message carriers. Donated by Mrs Challis. Photograph by Rachael Marshall.

The pigeons at Bletchley Park are such a  big part of the Station X project, so I went back to the Hut 8 for another look at the collection yesterday. This was after a quick look inside Block D, where I noticed that the bird that is on top of an old file in one of my photographs, 'Histories', in the exhibition is now on the floor where the sunlight doesn't reach its wings.