London is getting a new, improved US embassy. I may have mentioned this before. It’s going to be at Nine Elms, on the south bank of the Thames between Vauxhall Bridge and Battersea power station. A couple of days ago, Dyv & I were on our way to the Tate Gallery. Getting off the train at Vauxhall, we saw for the first time the grandiose pile of wooden blocks and green plastic that is the world headquarters of MI6.
Inside Vauxhall Station, near the exit and no more than a hundred metres from MI5, is this modest “Private” office.
A Bad Guide 
The tantalizing crack in the door along with the unfortunate posture of the symbolic figure prompt one to wonder whether the business that goes on in that private loo might perhaps be… waterboarding?
In the toilets at Vauxhall Station? I’d confess anything.
Just take care never to utter the word “goat”, or things will go harder on you in the end.
International symbols can be misleading. I took the sign to mean “the CIA is bent over”. It’s not clear whether this is because of osteoporosis, or in order to accomodate another cottager, or something quite different.
I took the symbol as “the CIA is slipping away”…
Whatever it is, it’s private.
Not sure how to contact you, AJP, but thought you might be interested in this:
A love of desolation and ruins
From the neo-gothic follies of 18th-century aristocrats to the blasted cityscapes of contemporary Detroit, ruins have long obsessed artists
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/ruin-lust-tate-britain/#.U0LW5a1dWIk
Maybe it’s better from here (I don’ think you need the arcane code at the and, which will probably identify you as me).
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/ruin-lust-tate-britain/
I’m very pleased you thought of me for this, Robe. As it happens, Dyv & I saw this show of ruins that day at the Tate (actually it was her birthday, 11 March). The concrete bunker at the top was a huge photograph in its own room and I think I liked it the best, although it was good to see all the small Turners too.
I tried taking a picture, but the guard got cross with me; there’s no consistent policy about this: it seems to be fine at the British Museum and the V&A, but unacceptable at the National Portrait Gallery & the Tate. It may be a question of 3rd party copyright protection.
The other Tate, the new one in the former power station, gets much more press than the old Tate, now called ‘Tate Britain’ does. It’s too bad, because I think its shows are generally better and the permanent collection is somewhere between jolly good & stunning.