Basement Access

Because of the crazy driverless lorries, the pavements are no longer safe, and we are forced to walk along high ledges, parapets and rooves.

My shadowy partner is more fit than me jumping up athletically; I just can't do it.

We decide the other option is to travel through the city basements avoiding danger that way. A special booklet is provided which is like a kind of basement passport.

I don't think it will work - I am sure no-one will know what it is.

Underground Performance Artist

At the end of the show a performance artist clambers down from the stage into a hole below the trapdoor. There he slips into a coffin his actions unseen. The audience is entralled but even more so when it is revealed that his sister has been patiently lying in a neighbouring chamber throughout the whole evening, checking that everything is in place.

Although the performance has officially finished the cast from Coronation Street troop in to watch.

Still Centre

I am in a basement with a group of women, some of them my close female friends - a few appear in more than one place at a time. There is a convivial, chaotic atmosphere, in the middle of which a stark film is being shot. The sound will be added later so the noise of everyone chatting and bustling about will be edited out. The camera focuses on one woman sitting alone and still against a stone wall.

Underground Passages

An image as if from an old black and white film of a young blonde woman dressed 1930's style - white blouse , straight skirt. She is looking for doorways, walking tentatively through a labyrinth of underground passages lit by oil lamps.

The Purple Parsnips' Mother

A man shows me a group of purple parsnips in the ground and explains to me that they will have a purple turnip as a mother. As we dig down, the soil turns to thick black liquid and I find myself under the surface closely inspecting these parsnip/turnips. They are choked with ivy and water weeds. I pull one and deliver it up to the surface. It is now a small dog's tail and wags with pleasure at having been set free.

Water Water Everywhere

It is a cold grey day by the sea and one of the twins from the 80's boyband Bros turns up in a sports car heading to the beach for his regular swim. I decide to go for a swim too - I haven't been for a while. The sea is too cold even for a Bros twin, and he goes into the swimming pool instead. I go downstairs into the basement to the changing rooms. They seem empty and waterlogged. "Is it open?" I ask one sleepy guy. He nods pointing to an unmanned cash desk.

Twins In The Basement

Two male twins from somewhere like Srylanka are down in the basement looking for a Nuffield book of plans. They haven't seen me in a long while and acknowledge me with a smile. "Is it in your space?" they ask me. "I haven't seen it," I reply, "but it's possible." The twins' eyes merge together- it is difficult to tell which one I am looking at.