The Shelley Memorial Project Commission

Option A - David A Annand

‘Ozymandias’, was the obligatory read in a secondary school in very conservative Perth. Alas, it went no further with Shelley. I came back to poetry as I matured and worked in public art and now have anthologies at my bedside. Now as an immature, elderly adolescent it is a joy to rediscover Shelley.

To this end, I feel a need to broadcast his work. It is a huge benefit that the site is on the footpath to the College of Richard Collyer. Shelley has so much to offer to students. I would offer a presentation to the students of Art, English literature, interested departments and other interested external groups inviting the students to read his work and recommend which quote would best lead people into the sculpture to win hearts and minds for Shelley.

The sculpture will be a simple design of a stainless-steel chaise-longue based on an art deco cloud design with a bronze figure of Shelley reclining and reading.

Digitally bead-blasted on the chaise-longue would be Shelley’s details in one area and the chosen quote in another. My fabricator would make a template of the seat in mild steel on which I would model a figure of Shelley to get an exact fit for the finished stainless-steel seat. The figure would then be cast in bronze and mounted on the stainless-steel seat.

The sculpture would be mounted at ground level on the site so that people could interact with it, read his words and sit with him.

Option B - The Broadbent Studio

Born in Warnham in 1792, Percy Bysshe Shelley was a restless spirit who believed in movement and change. A teenage political activist, declared atheist and rejector of traditional institutions such as marriage, he was trouble and was forced to leave the country. But what lay at the heart of his subversive thinking was a romantic feeling for nature. Shelley saw energy flowing through the natural world, animating, overturning, renewing - bringing everything to life. Likewise, for society to flourish, it must open itself to new, unsettling ideas. For people to flourish, they must open themselves to the forces of nature.

Shelley expressed this attitude in many of his poems, most famously in his Ode to the West Wind. Here, he sees the autumn wind shaking up waves, clouds and leaves. He hears it blowing through the forest, playing it like a musical instrument. He calls on it to lift him up too like a leaf, to play through him too like a musical instrument, blowing out of him fresh, dynamic thoughts and words.

So our design for a Shelley memorial is a sculpture of the West Wind with the poet abandoning himself to it. He allows it to lift him up with the autumn leaves and blow out of him his writings. Nature, man, words - all are in a state of flux, energised by the wind.

The sculpture would be fabricated from thick metal plate, the shapes cut, rolled and welded together. This would create a structure that is light and open whilst being very robust and durable. A plinth would raise it out of harm’s way and offer a place to sit. We have illustrated it at a scale to be seen as people enter the park and we have orientated it along an east-west axis.

Option C - Vincent Gray

My approach to the Shelley Memorial Commission is to create an iconic monument which proudly reflects and celebrates the philosophies, beliefs and vision of Shelley as well as being intellectually engaging, and in harmony with the landscape and public realm.

The site, being at the centre of a circus and at the confluence of a number of intersecting paths, scale and presence are key considerations. The memorial will be seen initially within the open park landscape and approached from a distance, the main thoroughfare along an attractive tree lined avenue of Fastigiate Oak.

The design, neo-classical in style, is clean in form and weighted in the romantic, a celebration of creativity in all its forms. A timeless piece relevant to current and future communities with the emphasis on enhancing cultural experience.

Bronze hand and quill with blue-green patina atop an inscribed monolithic Portland Stone pillar raised up on two shallow steps reflects the ancients on which our society is built. Inscribed thereon are quotes and words so eloquently penned by Shelley including (front façade)

"AWAY, AWAY, FROM MEN AND TOWNS, TO THE WILD WOOD AND THE DOWNS, - TO THE SILENT WILDERNESS, WHERE THE SOUL NEED NOT REPRESS ITS MUSIC."

The composition is comprised of three elements; stepped base, supporting pillar and sculpture with an overall height of over 3 metres. Constructed of stone and bronze the work will be durable, maintenance free and hardy enough to withstand vandalism. The pillar, capped with a bronze hand and quill with milky blue-green patina is poised ready in elegant pose.

Option D - Rob Ward

In response to the stated aims of the brief my work seeks to address the spirit and essence of Shelley's philosophy, to enhance and connect with the environment and convey reflections of art in society today. My vehicle for this is a nonrepresentational group of sculptures, set within mirrored surfaces, placed to interact with the site.

I am not seeking to personify Shelley but to make a poetic equivalent in the spirit of his poetry referencing particular poems to reflect, literally and metaphorically his enduring legacy to embody his inspiration and radicalism. The work seeks to “entertain” be dynamic, a magnetic centre for the community.

SCULPTURE 1: SKYLARK (“Hail to thee, blithe spirit!”) The work is a simple circular bronze cast with a bird perched centrally. It is a symbol of nature, growth and harmony.

SCULPTURE 2: POPPIES (Ode to the west wind) “Oh lift me as a wind, a leaf, a cloud”. Three grouped bronze casts resembling poppies for remembrance.

SCULPTURE 3: TIME PASSING (Mutability) “We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon”.
Two bronze love stools for sitting on to look, contemplate and be photographed on.

Each sculpture to be accompanied by a poem. The aim is to offer a reflective distorted ongoing dialogue with the viewer, the place and the community encompassing the poetic ideal visually. An imaginative presence which “awakens and enlarges the mind by rendering it the receptacle of a thousand apprehended receptacles of thought”.