Francis Al˙s: Seven Walks

22 October 2005, The Daily Telegraph

Pick of the Week
by Richard Dorment

Stunning as Rachel Whiteread’s project at the Tate Modern is, small-scale works of art can touch you in ways that spectacular installations can’t. So it is with Artangel’s exhibition of work by the Belgian artist Francis Al˙s: his 29-minute film Guards- one of the “Seven Walks”- appeals to the part of my brain that releases serotonin and makes me happy.

In 2004, Artangel borrowed 64 men from the seventh company of Goldstream Guards, asking that they be driven to the City of London early one weekend morning in early July wearing red tunics, bearskin caps and highly polished boots. On the day, Al˙s handed the commanding officer an envelope containing a set of instructions, like a battle plan a general presents to his officers before an attack.

The men were to disperse and to walk separately through the City of London’s ancient narrow streets and soul-less modern piazzas. When one soldier met another, they fell in together and marched until they met another soldier or group of soldiers. At the point when all 64 men had formed their full 8x8 formation, they marched to the nearest bridge and then dispersed.

Al˙s has devised an elaborate game of “sardines”, but one that is unexpectedly mesmerising to watch, and even more amazing to hear (he attached microphones to the soldiers’ boots). The units swerve around parked cars without breaking rank, and march up steps using a shorter pace as if it were the easiest thing in the world.

At the end is the glorious moment when they finally reach the bridge, break up and tear off their furry caps. What had been a faceless military mass instantly becomes human again, an ordinary group of young men sweating and exhausted and delighted to have their ordeal over.