Vomit Vault of London

London's most disgusting exhibition

The studio hosted a week-long public exhibition, between 8-12 April, at The Crypt Gallery London to celebrate the release of their corresponding publication, Salute to Puke.

Featuring:
• Party bag ‘sick bags’ on entry
• Curated puke photography exhibition featuring splats and a spew spectrum
• Powerful and provocative scents crafted by JPL Flavours
• Refreshing mouthwash cocktails
• Visitor vomitorium

Bompas & Parr curated a sickening scent installation using smells developed by flavour technologists, JPL. The olfactory stations atomised the smell of bin juice, urine, sweaty feet and of course, puke.

Visitors could document their most grotesque puke stories in the ghastly exhibition guest book which weaves together a rich tapestry of pleasure and regret documenting the best and worst of London.

Why now: City of hurlers

London’s a city of gorgers and pukers. Where ritualised power drinking, apex capitalist consumption and libertine values collide, bodies are pushed to their limit. The City’s stomachs disgorge, to festoon pavements across the city with colourful mucilage.

And though TfL noted that their vehicles were “soiled” a total of 14,632 times in 2018, and vomiting’s a human commonality, relatively little work has been produced around the levelling experience of puking after (or during) a night of excess.

As once-isolated workers come back to the elevated pressures of office drinks and rounds-culture post-pandemic, inexperienced livers and unlimbered throats are punished by the need to keep pace with heartier colleagues. 2022 sees the return of ‘the reversal’ –– a term used in competitive-eating when someone can contain their stomach’s contents no longer.

Backdrop of sickening delights

The Crypt Gallery provided an intensely atmospheric backdrop to celebrate the art of throwing up, kept under the watchful eye of the caryatids. The Crypt of St Pancras Parish Church was designed and used for coffin burials from 1822, when the Church was opened, to 1854, when the crypts of all London churches were closed to burials.

The disgusting and illuminating installation, hosted within the dank setting of the crypt, was designed to provoke thoughts, imagination and emotions on this once taboo subject. Can you discern the future in a puddle of sick?

Salute to Puke publication

Available to purchase here.

Salute to Puke, Bompas & Parr’s latest edition, showcases the rituals of puking, with satirical nuances along the way. Hurl your way through this eccentric book documenting the history, science and art of being sick, complete with vomit as an index of economic and social recovery.

Featuring:
• Pleasures of the vomitorium
• Physiological and biological phenomena of puke
• 22 horrible photos from the streets of London
• Wipe-clean cover

Salute to Puke 2: Regurgitated Tales publication

Capturing puke stories from the spew enthusiasts, culture tinglers and strange and magnificent folk who came to the Vomit Vault of London show, the Salute to Puke 2: Regurgitated Tales celebrates the interpersonal storytelling documented in the Library of Mucilage visitor book. These are so full of humour, pathos, horror and heart that we present them for your queasy consideration.

Tantalising excerpts from the publication:

Limited-edition zine dropping soon...