Bridge Commission Audio Walks
A series of downloadable audio recordings by writers, including novelists Adam Thirlwell, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Valeria Luiselli, designed to last for the duration of the walk from the Serpentine Gallery over the Serpentine Bridge to the Serpentine North Gallery.
A literary journey into the fertile imagination of some of the world’s most compelling writers, the commission explores the five-minute walk over the bridge between the Serpentine Gallery and its 2013 addition, the Serpentine North Gallery.
Visitors can download the recordings onto their mobile phones. Each recording lasts for the duration of the walk from the Serpentine Gallery, through Kensington Gardens and over the Serpentine Bridge to the Serpentine North Gallery.
Choose a featured author
- Valeria Luiselli
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 1: Valeria Luiselli – In this walk, written by Valeria Luiselli, a child accompanies the visitor, taking them on a journey in an imaginary future in which the Galleries are but a distant memory.
- Ben Lerner
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 2: Ben Lerner – This walk, an excerpt from Ben Lerner’s forthcoming novel, finds the protagonist couple walking from Central Park to the Brooklyn Bridge, as the city and their uncertain destiny moves before and around them.
- Alan Pauls
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 3: Alan Pauls, ‘Regency Green’ – A woman in a green raincoat walks along a bridge, recalling a passionate, bygone affair. The last time she saw her lover, she recalls, was on this very bridge…
- Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 4: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – An awakening, to the sound and dust of the Harmattan wind.
- John Jeremiah Sullivan
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 5: John Jeremiah Sullivan – … in which the author recalls his mother’s fear of bridges and the fundamental role one particular bridge played in his early life.
- Luisa Geisler
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 6: Luisa Geisler, ‘Oxygenation’ – A man walks through the market to meet his father. As he walks, the noises and smells around him become more and more stifling…
- Adam Thirlwell
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 7: Adam Thirlwell, ‘Five Prophecies’ – Can a person’s entire life change in the time it takes to walk over a bridge?
- Natasha Soobramanien
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 8: Natasha Soobramanien, ‘Gephyrophobia‘ – Inspired by the original purpose of the Magazine as a gunpowder store, this short story follows a would-be visitor to the building.
- Sophia Al-Maria
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 9: Sophia Al-Maria, ‘King Tide’ – A sound capsule exhumed from the future reflects on climate, apocalypse and the origins of time itself.
- Evan Calder Williams
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 10: Evan Calder Williams, ‘The Hinterland’ – A letter from the bridge of a different 2014.
- Alejandro Zambra
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Bridge Commission Audio Walk 11: Alejandro Zambra, ‘True Stories’ – Overcoming shyness in 1980s Chile.
- René Pollesch
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Bridge Commission Audio Walks 12: René Pollesch – A meditation on theatre and empty space.
- Bedwyr Williams
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Bridge Commission Audio Walks 13: Bedwyr Williams‘ ‘Bombasto’ – A small music holder for a trumpet in a marching band tells its life story. Edited by Sally O’Reilly.
