The Ride of Life

In the late 1980s a group of radical artists and automata makers were commissioned to make a theme ride to fill 15000 square feet of the Meadowhall shopping centre in England It was to be a journey made on a sofa trundling through more than 20 scenes of everyday life The project was inspired by the Cabaret Mechanical Theatre in Covent Garden and features a dozen or so makers including Paul Spooner and Tim Hunkin and a completely bonkers maker called John White who made three of the scenes disorientation the upside down bedroom and motorway madness in the film he demonstrates his giant gear wheels made of ice There was also a magnificent Heaven made in Cornwall and a Hell made in Hebden Bridge The project was completed but never installed Most of it is now lost except for the Pubic Bar scene