Margate’s new £17.5 million gallery of contemporary art was opened today by artist Tracy Emin who provided the gallery with its newest installation as she strangled a live goose on the steps. Watched by civic dignitaries, Emin explained how the goose’s struggle was symbolic of the creative act of getting up in the afternoon, scratching yourself, randomly doing something, and then presenting the result to a gallery for a nice slice of Art Council funding. The goose will now be attached to a fifteen metre rubber hosepipe and installed the main hall where visitors will be encouraged to play it like a bugle.

‘This is going to be on the country’s best galleries so I was delighted to be on hand to strangle this goose and to turn it into a rubberised bugle,’ said Emin.

Animal rights campaigners did not mar the event after being assured that it was only a metaphorical goose strangulation being used for the purposes of lowbrow satire.