This is my photo of the finished artwork by Adam Dant from the UK General Election of 2016, ‘the Government Stable’ which is on display in Portcullis House in Westminster. You can read more about it and see explanations of what all of it means on Parliament’s website here and you can see all his sketches from the campaign trail here.
I think it’s great fun and leaves you with an impressionist sense of a massively complicated election campaign. There’s one part of it on the lower to middle left hand side where I have a personal connection. Here’s my close-up:
It’s a patterned screen from the Dabawalla Indian restaurant in Cardiff which is where, in the last days of the election campaign, Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg stopped off as part of his journey from Lands End to John O’Groats. There was an enormous amount of media interest and amongst the camera crews, network TV reporters, newspaper correspondents and sketchwriters was an intriguing person who was sketching everything. This was Adam Dant.
As for that screen, it provided the backdrop for my (so far) final interview with Nick Clegg and caused a lot of amusement when people pointed out that I’d apparently chosen to wear a tie made from the same pattern. Judge for yourself.
