James King, Eamonn and Friends

Walking along the left bank of the Thames on our way to the Tate Modern we noticed a couple of interesting looking stains on a flagstone of the pavement. Eamonn and I were wearing trilby hats and had words written across our foreheads. Eamonn's was OB, and mine was SERVE. I was dressed in a dark grey suit.

Eamonn and I chalked a colourful frame around the flagstone. (Earlier we had been discussing the phenomenon of elaborate picture frames which sometimes were sometimes more interesting than the enclosed picture.) The frame surrounded two stains on the ground, obviously caused by liquid spillage of some kind. The larger of the two marks, near the bottom left of the square, resembled (to my mind) a squatting figure. The smaller blob graced a space near the right hand corner.

Under our frame we chalked what we thought was an appropriate title: THE LONELY TROLL'S SERENADE TO THE MOON. A few hundred yards further along we stopped fornenst the National Film Theatre building, on a wide area of the embankment, with bench seats nearby. Some cracked paving stones attracted our attention. One in particular seemed suitable for our purposes. It had been cracked into eleven distinct segments. Using brightly coloured chalk Eamonn and I coloured in each separate area. Using it three times, yellow predominated.

We couldn't readily agree upon a title. "RED RIDING HOOD IN A SUNLIT MEADOW" appealed to me. Our indecision resulted in consensus. The three of us wrote words of our choice, in response to the mosaic, radiating out all around it. Some of these were : POND, EARTH, FIELDS, RIDING HOOD, TRAMADINDE, CULTURE, RESTORATION, RESURRECTION, ABSTRACT (suggested by a passer-by) MANZELLIK, DAWN TILL DAWN, DUSK TILL DUSK, SUNNY MEADOW, BROKEN PROMISE, SWEET DREAMS.

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As we were finishing off the security men arrived. Three in orange tee shirts, one in black. The leader was a young, well-built cockney - definitely a hawk rather than a sparrow. The one in black was older, stouter and calmer. A second orange looked like a young Les Dawson, without the humour. Third was a young black man with a limp, who was thoroughly embarrassed by the whole situation. I will refer to him as Michael. Hawk told us that this was private property and what we were doing was graffiti. How would we like it if someone did it to our house? We said that we thought we were on public property and what we were doing was art. After an unresolvable argument about the nature of art we decided to leave and continue on our journey. Hawk had other ideas. He told us to remove our chalking, to clean it up. We had no intention of removing our recently completed work and turned to go. Hawk, Stout and Les determinably blocked our way and physically stopped us leaving. Then ensued a debate about how we could remove the mosaic , even if we wanted to. We eventually agreed to clean it off if they would provide the materials. In a spirit of co-operation Guy accompanied Les into the nearby National Film Theatre building. They returned with the only available cleaning resource - five large plastic glasses of water !!!!! (They could have had more bottled water if they paid for it).

Hawk told us to pour the water over our work. We watched as the colours swam together and the resulting shallow purple/ brown pond slowly seeped through the cracks. Hawk thought this looked worse than ever, and finding a newspaper commanded us to wipe up the ground with it. We thought it would be demeaning to kneel on the ground scrubbing it with paper and refused. I walked towards a bench seat. Hawk blocked my way. I pushed against him . He retaliated, pushing against my chest . I pushed back, and finding that he was made of steel, retreated and took a detour to the seat. by this time a more senior security man had arrived in a white shirt, grim face and scottish accent. Equally as hostile as Hawk, Grim threatened us with the police. We were unmoved and insisted upon proper cleaning materials. We sat on the bench and read from The Complete Works of Shelley, which Eamonn had bought for me as a birthday present in a second - hand book stall near our 'Troll' frame. Consequently feeling suitably high minded I decided to wipe up the remaining coloured water with a piece of newspaper of our own. By this time a mop, bucket and brush had arrived. (Perhaps they had successfully succeeded where I had failed - in borrowing these implements from an adjacent, street theatre set which was standing idle but guarded ) In response to Hawk's reference to my change of heart I said that using the newspaper now was MY CHOICE. I proceeded to scrub. (Michael had to be stopped by hawk and Grim from doing it for me with a mop) I scrubbed ritualistically, and slowly. As each piece of paper became sodden and crumbly I laid it carefully to the side, before sliding another sheet from beneath my knees to crumple into a new scrubbing pad.

Once more we prepared to leave. "Oh no," says Hawk - "What about the other one - you've to clean that one up too." He was referring to the Troll Frame. This was too much. This was petty bullying; this was fascism. We calmly, clearly and firmly refused, and sat waiting the promised arrival of the metropolitan police.

After a further wait Guy and I decided to go and see if what they were referring to was indeed our work , and to decide how we would feel about removing it when the police arrived. The posse accompanied us on the five minute walk. The Troll Frame looked well. And there was so little chalk involved. In the meantime a woman mime artist had appeared, dressed in white and was earnestly plying her trade near by.

I wanted a further chat with Eamonn before deciding anything. Grim refused to let me return, accusing me of playing games. Instead he sent Michael to fetch him. He then told me that when we had cleaned up ( assuming that we would) we would have to leave the embankment and that we would be barred from returning at any time in the future. Eamonn and two smart looking young, white-shirted policemen arrived about the same time. Exchanging looks between us we silently decided to comply with police requirements. I explained the nature of our work to one of the young officers. The other told Guy that the embankment pavement was private land , and we had effectively committed criminal damage by changing the appearance of the property. We would be taken away and charged if we didn't remove what we had done.

I took up the brush and bucket, and said that i would even remove the original stain. The officer who had been talking to me said that wouldn't be necessary. Ritualistically I brushed the ground. The mime artist , though rather upstaged by us and the security presence, bravely continued her routine. I slowly cleaned each of the five flagstones which our frame had bordered upon. Eamonn observed later that a compelling aspect of this final act was that I was dressed in a smart suit and hat and the word SERVE written on my forehead. And it did feel like the last act of a drama - a drama which had been created by the security men.

They each had their own character, and each had their own interpretation of the security man role. Hawk was a vicious bouncer; Grim a vindictive bully; Les wanted a quiet life and tagged along; Stout was calmly competent and experienced; and Michael was sympathetic and kind.

There are fascinating ironies to all of this. The first is that we had actually enhanced the environment. We had transformed an unsightly stain into a poetic image, and had made a colourful collage of a broken flagstone. And for this we were accused of criminal damage and banished from the embankment! The other irony is that only a few yards away was an example of the work of Banksy. Banksy is an anti-authority graffiti artist who uses spray paint and stencils to make anti-war and anti -monarchy images all around London. His work actually embellishes ancient walls and in spray paint. Banksy is now courted by multi- national corporations (institutions of the establishment) to work for them. Of course he refuses. But he gets away with it. His much publicised works permanently remain on walls - yet we are hounded for ephemeral and colourful chalking! A third irony would be that the metropolitan bobbies at the end of it all, politely directed us to the Tate Modern. Our walkabout there, as OB and SERVE is another story.