27 May 2012
An art event by Rachael House to mark thirty-five years since the Sex Pistols’ Thames boat trip, with guests the Strawberry Thieves Choir.
Southwark Park Lake, outside the entrance to Cafe Gallery, Southwark Park, Bermondsey, London SE16 2UA, Sunday 27th May 2012, 2pm-4pm
Rachael House with CGP London
It is 2012, and Londoners live in interesting times. Anniversaries of sunken ships, dead writers, reigning monarchs AND a whole lot of people rushing around very quickly in east London. Yet, with all the celebrations, one important cultural landmark has been completely overlooked.
Rachael House invites you to join her in remedying this historical oversight. 2012 is the thirty-fifth anniversary of the Sex Pistols abortive boat trip on the Thames. Two weeks after the release of their hit single God Save The Queen, and a week ahead of the Silver Jubilee Flotilla, the Sex Pistols performed a concert on a boat (appropriately named The Queen Elizabeth) on the Thames. Swiftly stopped by the police, a barney ensued and many were arrested, including Vivienne Westwood (now Dame Vivienne).
The Strawberry Thieves Choir, with placards, banner and bunting by Rachael House 
Rachael House’s Jordan boat 
Kit Poulson with boat made by Kit Poulson, Edwina Ashton and Mirabel Ashton-Poulson 
Jane Harris’ boat 
Anne Robinson with her boat 
Some participants in a group photograph at the end of the event 
The flotilla begins 
Apathy’s a Drag table display
Apathy’s a drag promises to be an art event as British as Country Life butter. Rachael invites you to make a model wind-powered boat, to float on Southwark Park Lake and form part of a spectacular flotilla. Punk coracles, new wave rafts, police launches, Sex Pistols sailing ships, folk fishing vessels- all of these and more are welcome to take part.
This CGP London art event will take place on Southwark Park Lake, outside the entrance to Cafe Gallery. This beautiful lake is the home of abundant wildlife, so please ensure that your model boat is attached to string (or something similar) and that it may be easily retrieved. Materials used must not be harmful to inhabitants of the lake.
Special guests, the magnificent Strawberry Thieves Choir, will provide rousing inspirational songs. Named after a design by early punk pioneer William Morris, Strawberry Thieves Choir embody the passion, politics and DIY ethos of punk rock, with somewhat different tunes.
no future, no future, no future for you, no future for me! Now is the future shaped by the Sex Pistols and other less benign powers. It’s not about nostalgia, our actions fashion history. We have to make them count. So make a model boat, dig out your best punk clobber and be part of apathy’s a drag, the most significant commemorative art event of the year.
Biographical notes – Rachael House is an artist who makes events and objects. Recent projects include Blackpool Pet-Tastic, Grundy Art Gallery, 2009, Peckham Peacocks, Peckham Space, 2010 and group show All is Not Lost, curated by Emily Druiff, CGP London, 2011. Forthcoming projects in 2012 include Small World curated by Alison Marchant, and Pittsburgh Pet-Tastic, US. Rachael’s comic strip, also titled apathy’s a drag, will be in Tooting Free Press, edited by Charlotte Young and Michael Curran. Rachael House is co-director of artist run Space Station Sixty-Five.
