UNITED KINGDOM: Artist Anya Gallacio invites visitors to drink absolute vodka to build ice sculpture at the design museum

Record ID: 336468

  • Title: UNITED KINGDOM: Artist Anya Gallacio invites visitors to drink absolute vodka to build ice sculpture at the design museum
  • Date: 24th January 2001
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM, (JANUARY 24, 2000) (REUTERS) (NIGHTSHOTS) WS LONDON BRIDGE (0.09) MV EXTERIOR OF DESIGN MUSEUM WITH ICE BLOCK (0.15) VARIOUS OF ICE BLOCK (3 SHOTS) (0.36) SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English) ARTIST ANYA GALLACCIO SAYING "The ice has been cut from a lake in the north of Sweden which is where Absolut Vodka come from, from Lapland, and they're about a m
  • Embargoed: 8th February 2001 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Topics: Arts,Quirky,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky
  • Reuters ID: LVA20E2527JCLZDWM7AYET41QZ54
  • Story Text: Whether you like your vodka neat or with a twist - artist Anya Gallaccio has come up with a novel way of drinking and displaying it.
    Against the dramatic backdrop of Tower Bridge, London's design museum and Absolut Vodka have come up with a novel way of promoting English artist Anya Gallacccio's work. Gallaccio, who uses ice as her medium, has created glasses made of ice that she subsequently turns into a huge ice sculpture.
    On Wednesday (January 24), in an event open to the public, 1,000 visitors to the museum were invited to participate in this novel way of consuming vodka.
    The lure of free alcohol was too good to resist for the many that queued on the banks of the River Thames to watch Gallaccio work. Once inside visitors were invited to don a pair of rubber gloves, choose a glass carved from a metre cubed block of ice, and then fill it with any number of colourful vodka combinations before passing it outside to the artist to use in her creation. One visitor described the process as 'Alice in Wonderland' experience "having a drink while your glass melts"
    The blocks of ice used to build this work of art have been shipped from Jukkasjarvi in Lapland, where they were carved from the frozen Thorne River three weeks ago.
    Chosen because of their purity, the ice blocks are similar to those used in the construction of Sweden's famous ice hotel. According to Galaccio the aim of the exercise was to "build up a structure so it will be kind of an architectural thing but because hopefully there'll be bits of colour in some of the glasses, it will function a bit like a three-dimensional stained glass window".
    The finished sculpture will remain on display at London's Design museum until it melts.
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