Children’s Games, Heygate Estate 2002

Overview

In this work Mark Lewis highlights the gap between utopian visions and everyday realities. The camera glides around a complex network of empty walkways in South London’s soon-to-be-demolished Heygate Estate, with the seamless movement of a computer game. Every detail is precisely planned and produced, from the perfect spring weather to the child actors playing in communal spaces. We are forcefully drawn into the image as the camera glides through the estate’s narrow paths, creating a metaphor fo