Since being collectively taken out by the floods on 26th December, about two-thirds of Hebden Bridge town centre has reopened. There have been some subtle moves around, as well — like here, with the toy shop, Silly Billy’s, translocating to a new location on Old Gate and reopening in the last week or so. Playmobil Man serves as an advert to draw the punters in — let’s hope it does so.
Sir John Barbirolli was conductor of the Hallé orchestra, the UK’s oldest extant symphony orchestra, from 1943 until his death in 1970. The Hallé now reside at the Bridgewater Hall, built in 1996, and this bust of Barbirolli sits outside the venue — as you can see. I hope to be doing a fairly big project here over the next couple of years so expect to see more of this place, if all comes to pass.
This is Alan Turing’s second ‘personal’ appearance on the blog (the other being here) not to mention that of the building named after him at university. Members of my family haven’t appeared as often. Then again, I probably walk past Turing more often.
This very pleasant square is where I am currently working when I am in London (well, on one of the buildings which border it, anyway). The statue is of Mahatma Gandhi and has been there since 1968. The other model was probably just passing through.
James Fraser was Bishop of Manchester in the 1880s and like other prominent local men (always men) of that time is commemorated with this statue in Albert Square. Apparently he was pictured looking away from the Town Hall (behind) because he disliked it so much. Right now he can look at the Chinese lanterns that are dangling from the nearby trees in preparation for Chinese New Year in a couple of weeks. No festival celebrated too early.
Although there are other eminent candidates, Alan Turing is probably the most famous single scientist ever to have worked at the University of Manchester. If it wasn’t for his work on the philosophical-technological basis of computing – the idea that a machine did not have to be built to perform one task, but could perform many, if it were given the right instructions – we might not be sitting here doing all these things we do with ICT. On the other hand, if he hadn’t been persecuted for his sexuality, and committed suicide as a result, who knows how much further the technology could have advanced. This memorial to him sits (literally) in Sackville Gardens, at the corner of Whitworth and Sackville Streets, Manchester.
Let’s think about it: will either David Cameron or George Osborne will have a statue erected to them in a hundred and twenty years’ time that will extol their contribution ‘To The Public Good? Considering the ideological stance of their party is that there is no such thing as ‘the public good’, I doubt they would want to see such a memorial.
On the other hand, considering that Mr. Heywood’s era resulted in Manchester becoming one of the most powerful and successful cities in the world, and built art galleries and universities and football clubs, and Mr Cameron’s era in Manchester is largely characterised by the closure of all but one of the city’s public toilets, it should be easy enough to predict the answer to the question posed earlier.
Day off today. I went to see some excellent art in the Pushkin museum, including a Caravaggio exhibition. Now I don’t know a great deal about art but Caravaggio seems to me someone who really knows about lighting and movement. His paintings are 400 years old but look like they could be freeze-frames from modern movies. He’s a long way ahead of his contemporaries. However, for most of the time after his death in 1610 he was forgotten.
This, on the other hand, is Tsereteli’s monumental statue of Peter the Great by the Moscow River. It cost millions of roubles and can be seen for miles around. it looks like something my 8-year-old son would draw and every Muscovite I have spoken to about it, hates it. Tsereteli is a big mate of the mayor of Moscow, Mr Luzhkov, which may, or of course may not, explain why this monstrosity exists.
Somehow I suspect that in 400 years’ time, only one of these artists is going to be remembered.
Being 42 