Photographer Aidan Kelly muses upon The Spire Of Dublin.
Seeing the Spire in the centre of the our Dublin city for the very first time was out the front of a high speed taxi, and as the foulest-mouthed driver uttered "Would you look at that absolute waste of money” I wasn’t convinced, I wasn’t convinced of his argument, his St Christopher medal hanging from the mirror, that it was a waste of any space in fact for something so tremendous, I believed it had been very economical in its use of 'square footage'.
“Let me out” I said to the potbellied Dubliner and stood under its gleam. It was in my mind a perfect statement of how I felt about Dublin. And, in a way, what I thought Dublin had become. It was so clean, simple, tactile and circular that I had to hold it, it had brevity and disappeared into the sky with blindness from that rare day of sunshine. At night it was cleverly placed with its constant light to say to me, and I was listening, “You’re not lost". Something I say to bemused travellers unfolding those free maps.
What about the history of that particular place in the middle of the widest street in Ireland? Its place just there at the GPO, splitting O’Connell Mary and Talbot, a place of history, much like Nelson's memory, monumental, deserving of something that said all that and yet looked forward, like we desperately needed to do.
Ian Ritchie’s winning design was a hundred years or so away from the fading memory of a time gone by made of stone admiralty and no real reflection of the way Dublin was to become. It’s diversity, multiculturalism and changing streets, Unfortunately the same could be said of the original meeting place for generations, under the clock at Clerys, how many of those couples on first dates or catch-ups met and went onto to make families, brothers and sisters. a new generation who promptly moved their meeting spot to the former pillar, over at the spire, monument of light.
It’s not unlike seeing those waiting patiently at the airport arrivals to reunite with distant relatives returning home, back again after trials and tribulations or simply on holiday. Watch closely, just like those waiting at the spire, and you can see the first part of their day drain away as they stand, sit around and let time pass till eventually they meet up with the second part.
Inadvertently the gleam of the monument of light catches everyone.
It’s magnetic, stand anywhere near and the light will bounce back. The waiting hang on for sometimes longer than they were promised, desperately staring at their phones for confirmation that “It wont be too long” Students sit down and study, Mothers with their prams think they’ve seen the father with shopping in the far-off distance, everyone, tourists take photos of themselves to remember the day.
A young man waits, his eyes closed, facing the sunshine and nothing distracts him, everything slows down around him, nobody notices he’s drifted off. Like an oasis, the monument in the centre of the world is blessed with the chance to catch some calmness, you just need to know how to see and feel it.
View more work by Aidan Kelly here.
