January 2009

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In an earlier blog (Building a Legacy) I commented that architecture was a shared theme in the London and Rome mayoral elections. And just as Rome’s Mayor Gianni Alemanno conceded after his election that his pledge to tear down the Ara Pacis Museum was not a top priority, so has London’s new mayor done a U-turn on his proposal to replace the Fourth Plinth with a permanent statue of Sir Keith Park. In a letter read out to parliament, Johnson cited ‘planning issues’ and the site’s ongoing commitment to contemporary art as obstacles to the proposed memorial of the Battle of Britain hero. He also recognised ‘that this revolving programme has proved very popular with the public’.

There seems no end of criticism for the Fourth Plinth. Last week Jonathan Jones argued in The Guardian that the project is ‘a philanthropic but naïve attempt to popularise modern art’. His argument was that a plinth is a device alien and unsuited to contemporary art. While that may historically be the case, in my opinion it doesn’t diminish the success of the better sculptures we have seen but can in fact enhance it – as with Mark Wallinger’s statue of Christ, for example. With the announcement of the next artist to be given the spot only a matter of weeks away, I have to confess to having Fourth Plinth fatigue. So I suggest an alternative to Gormley’s proposal of having a different member of the public on the plinth for an hour at a time, 24 hours a day. Divide volunteers for Gormley’s human installation into two groups – those in favour of the plinth and those against, and see which lasts the longer. I suspect those in favour will reveal a fighting spirit that would make even Sir Keith Park proud.

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