Image: Johnny Savage
It rains overnight so I spend some of Friday morning patching up leaks in my tent and moving cups around to gather dripping water. It's pretty bleak out and I find it difficult to muster enough energy to ascend to the summit and begin my day. I make some porridge for breakfast and I spend a lot of the day reading 'And Then There Were None', an Agatha Christie murder mystery about twelve people being killed off quickly on an island off the coast of Devon. One of the characters, a Dr Armstrong muses about islands,'There was something magical about an island - the mere word suggested fantasy. You lost touch with the world - an island was a world of its own. A world, perhaps, from which you might never return'.
In the afternoon I luckily notice a bottle bobbing its way towards me on the Liffey, I leap down to the shore to rescue it and find inside a questionnaire and a pencil. I was secretly hoping somebody might try this and I'm very grateful and excited to finally be the recipient of a message in a bottle.
As the evening wears on it becomes bitterly cold, posssibly the most miserable since I have taken up residence here and reluctantly I retire to my tent some time around 9pm. I can't believe my time on this island is nearly up, the week has passed quickly and my concept of time has become a little confused. I go to sleep early, incredibly pleased that my tenure on the Liffey has been a personal success and despite a brief interruption on Monday the week has flown by in no time.
Saturday September 17
I've come to the end, seven days after first arriving here it is finally time to pack my bags and prepare for a return to the mainland. A family of swans whooshes over the island and land several meters from my tent. I reflect on my time here and form the opinion that the overriding sentiment I will bring with me from this performance is the overwhelming positivity and cheeriness of the hundreds, possibly thousands of people who engaged with the installation over the course of the week. I am further convinced that Dublin is a marvelous city and one that I am very proud to call home. At midday I take off my suit and dive into the Liffey and swim to shore. The performance is over. The island remains in place, uninhabited for one more week until September 24.
I would like to say a huge 'Thank You' to everybody who worked with me on this project and to those who reacted with it from the quays and on twitter and on this blog.
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