THE PILE OF PIPES

Now here's a curiosity that I feel comfortable with. It sits amongst the graffiti on the wall of the pumping station at the Gorrell Tank car park.

Before we continue, I must mention that my tour of Whitstable's curiosities has made me re-think my whole philosophy on art. In fact, I have decided that I need a new definition if I am to become the modern man. Henceforth, I shall regard art as:

This definition seems to work. It explains why my schoolteacher pinned my paintings on the wall before I had started them. It also excludes the Turner Prize. The downside is that it allows a rather larger section of the Tate Gallery to be admitted to the art world. 

Despite my new definition, I would argue that the pile of pipes at the Gorrell tank still cannot be regarded as art. However, the work does have diagrammatic merit because it explains water circulation.

Water falls out of the full cloud on the right of the picture and drops to earth via some conveniently located pipes. It then runs across the land and plops into the sea. Finally, it evaporates up a second set of pipes and fills an empty cloud on the left. (If only God had thought of pipes, life would have been a lot tidier).

One of the advantages of a diagram like this is that you can identify problems.... and, of course, there is a problem here. No-one is catching the water before it runs into the sea.... which is why we have a hosepipe ban in July.

So let's change things a bit and introduce a totally novel idea. We'll catch some. In fact, it couldn't be easier. We simply place a bucket in a convenient place.

That's better. Now I can water the Dahlias.