Pharmacy 2 is the reanimated child of Damien Hirst; it lives inside the Newport Street Gallery in a forsaken patch of Lambeth by the railway arches. This makes it look, inevitably, like the set of The Bill, but with a painting of Damien Hirst on a nearby wall, which would surely confuse the Bill. Pharmacy 1 was, for five years until 2003, in Notting Hill. So we are already doing better. It is said that the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain complained about Pharmacy 1, and worried it would confuse people looking for a real pharmacy, but I do not know if this was true. If it was, they were too stupid to live, even if they did eventually find a pharmacy.
The gallery looks like the interior of a shell. I ask a man behind a desk: is the gallery open? ‘To Damien, yes,’ he says. ‘He is bringing guests.’ Which I think means it is closed; except to Damien, who is bringing guests, which I am happy about but did not need to know.
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