I paid a visit to Linked in Leytonstone. Linked is a work by London based artist Graeme Miller. In 1999 the M11 link road was built, in order to build this road 400 homes had to be demolished, and Graeme’s happened to be one of them. Linked is a series of radio transmitters fitted to lampposts along the m11 road, where the houses that had been demolished once stood. These transmitters are constantly playing interviews conducted by Graeme of residents whose houses had been demolished. In order to experience these interviews, you need a small radio receiver to pick up the signal.  

After collecting a radio receiver and pair of headphones I walked along the route of where the transmitters are located. Listening to the interviews in the space where the persons house once was definitely makes the interview much more impactful. It did feel slightly odd walking around Leytonstone with a radio receiver pointing it at specific lampposts and stood there listening with headphones, however this experience is exactly what makes this work so brilliant. People being interviewed because their house is being demolished for a motorway is nothing new, its the sort of thing you would see on the news and perhaps not really take much notice of. But being stood in the exact place as their house, facing the road that their home and their life had been destroyed in order to build makes it feel much more real.  

I personally live next to a stretch of motorway in South London that was built around the same time as the M11 in Leytonstone, and much like the M11 hundreds of houses had to be demolished. Naturally I’ve heard countless anecdotes about the old houses that were knocked down 30 odd years ago, but they’ve never really made me think or feel anything. Whereas listening to the voices of people who had their houses demolished right where you are standing certainly makes you think, especially when you’re looking at a stretch of grey, soulless motorway that was deemed more important than people’s homes.