Science Museum Lates is held every month on a Wednesday night, with each event having a different exciting theme. Courtesy Science Museum
“Hello ladies and gentlemen,” trills a voice over the Science Museum PA system. “Starting now in Launchpad is a very exciting thermal imaging demo. If you want to know more, head towards the middle of the gallery where Charlotte is waiting to meet you. You may even get a chance to take part!”
Though these words strike me as having been intentionally chosen to clear the Science Museum of repressed adults, they actually seem to have inspired the opposite effect. Rather than flee the venue in droves, people do exactly as the voice suggests and within minutes the area in front of the thermal camera is thick with spectators.
Those at the back stand on tiptoe or try to negotiate a path to the front, where willing volunteers are wiping ice lollies against their faces in order to see the cold patches show up as dark stripes on their projected, heat-sensitive images.
Yes, alcohol may play a part – the museum has opened three temporary bars tonight – but throughout the event’s three-and-a-half hour duration, an isolated stairwell snog at closing time is the only unmistakably booze-fuelled event I witness. Besides, this level of enthusiasm was evident even before the doors opened, allowing the lengthy queue – stretching half way around the building despite the darkness and rain – to start shuffling towards the light.
Advertised as the first official instalment in “…a permanent programme of free, adult-only, late-night events,” this edition of Science Museum Lates tempts visitors with its Japanese theme, boasting DJs, Kendo demonstrations and a surfeit of origami. Those filing in from the wet streets are greeted by Taiko drummers, high on the glass bridge over the East Hall, their rhythms made cacophonous by the cavernous space.
Despite the adults-only label, the event is driven by pure, childlike excitement. In the Launchpad interactive gallery, clearly designed to appeal to under-16s with its displays of swirling carbon dioxide, bubble walls and whirlpool machines, the unceasing, high-pitched babble makes it hard to believe the room is devoid of prepubescents.
There’s no holding back – grown-ups spin wheels, swing pendulums and cackle gleefully at one another’s magnified faces and the measured, hands-in-pockets stroll usually adopted by museum visitors past school-leaving age is conspicuous by its absence, replaced with a sense of palpable abandon. The DJs in the corner are barely audible above the hubbub, and seem almost superfluous to requirements.
Early in the evening, I speak to international origami artist Mark Bolitho, who is preparing to demonstrate his trade. He admits to slight concern he may have trouble engaging people in the fiddly process, but when I pass him again a couple of hours later he’s surrounded by enough giant paper rockets, frogs and dinosaurs to open a theme park, and every elevated surface across the entire floor seems to have been commandeered by an adult intent on perfecting their folding technique.
Elsewhere, a demonstration entitled ‘Flash, Bang, Wallop!’ sees a roomful of adults adopting the protocol of a school assembly as we repeat scientific principles back at the alarmingly spirited host while sitting cross-legged on the floor.
International origami artist Mark Bolitho was just one of the attractions at the Science Museum Lates in January.
‘Light, heat, sound and movement,’ we mutter, then drone, then bellow as she repeatedly appends, ‘LOUDER!’ to her request that we repeat the four basic types of energy transfer.
When she later asks if we’re “willing to die for science,” I fleetingly wonder whether this is, as she insists, the same demonstration she performs for genuine school visitors during daylight hours. Nevertheless, I’m not surprised my own inner child – agog at being shown how to set alight flour, blow the lid off a paint tin and fire a Barbie doll out of a cannon into a wall – isn’t the only one in the room answering with an unequivocal, “Yes!”
Lates events take place monthly on a Wednesday night at the Science Museum, between 6.45 and 10pm.
The next instalment takes place on Wednesday March 18 2009. See The Science Museum website for more details.
