A local Artist has written in The Independent newspaper about her sadness for Margate.
Tracey Emin, famous for her bed-that-looks-like-mine-when-I-was-15-but-worth-£150,000, has a cloumn in the national newspaper and has written about how she grew up in the Town.
She tells how she dreads coming back to visit because everything is shutting or burning down.
She writes :
"It's strange to witness the death of a town. In some ways there is a melancholy romance. It's like the tragic set of a film, but the sad thing is that the star is Margate. Margate has become Britain's tragic Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard, almost nothing can save her.
I want someone who is a giant to come along and treat Margate like their very own special model village. I want them to return Margate to its man-made majestic beauty. I want them to lovingly recreate the scenic railway and the big wheel. Make Dreamlands a place possible for teenage lovers to have dreams, the Teddy Boys to whirl on the wurlitzer and Mods to dodge with their girlfriends on the dodgems, the Victorian promenade to be graced with beautiful, wrought-iron railings.
I want the giant to flick the switch on the battery box and Margate's summer lights to twinkle and dance between every guesthouse and hotel. I want all the boarded-up hotels and guest houses to be opened up and come alive again. Tiny figures to be placed at the Lido swimming pool. The giant bends down and nimbly, with thumb and forefinger, replaces the 30ft diving board.
I am not complaining, I am just making a sad observation. An observation I'm sure many, especially those who live in Margate, have made. This tiny knuckle of England has truly been forgotten, left somewhere in the early Eighties to just die and decay. What makes me very sad is that all that is lost of the better days, of the better times, of Margate are the things that have made Britain great. An inheritance lost that belongs to no other place in the world. "
A very poetic view of a deeply ugly problem.
Maybe the council can look for the giant, Tracey talks about, in the form of investment.
Maybe a giant lump-sum diverted from ridiculous plans to attract 'arty folks' to the Turner Centre.
Let's face it, these people are the ones that see beauty in a pile of rubbish.
............ Aha, I see now. Margate, perfect location.........It's a work of art.
Read Tracey Emin's article here
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