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Published: June 22nd 2018
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Man in contemplation
A man gets his ducks in a row - what is he going to do? A chance meeting of a stranger in the
Kelpies of Falkrik park led me to this rather more-stranger and quirky-odd place called "Another Place" in Crosby beech in Liverpool ! What ever it might be but definitely NOT just an another place as the name suggests.
It is a place where, literally one hundred naked-men statues stand in the beech looking at the sea and its horizon, as if contemplating about their next action - to do or not to do - what ever it might be. They just stand there in stoic-silence looking, kind of staring at the sea where the ships roll by effortlessly and off-shore windmills spin tirelessly. They are standing at different heights - the ones near the promenade are standing sunk up to their knees and as they go further towards the sea they get taller and taller and the ones standing closer to the receded-sea water at low tide times are the tallest and you can see them head to toe.
The effect is to reveal and hide them during the high and low tides. It is an intelligent inception and the execution of the concept was perfectly done in a beech where the tidal times are
Man in contemplation
He looks at the horizon easy to observe from the promenade. As the tide recedes the the man begins to appear starting from the promenade and slowly revealing the last man standing closer to the sea-water - all appear to be contemplating about what the future may hold by staring at the distant horizon. Are they going to jump in to swim to catch the ship that they missed or are they waiting for the ship to arrive to carry them to the distant promised land of milk and honey. It is easy to substitute ourselves into those men and wonder about our own future, what it may hold for us all.
Wikipedia says - Another Place is a piece of modern
sculpture by Sir
Antony Gormley located at
Crosby Beach in
Liverpool City Region, England. It consists of 100
cast iron figures facing towards the sea. The figures are modeled on the artist's own naked body.
The work proved controversial due to the "offensive" nature of the naked statues but has increased tourism to the beach. After being exhibited at two other locations in Europe a meeting by
Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council on 7 March 2007 decided that the sculptures should be permanently installed at the beach. <sup
Man in contemplation
What is he thinking of. Is he going to do something. Or just stare endlessly at the endless sea. id="cite_ref-:0_2-0" class="reference">
CONSTRUCTION HISTORY The work consists of
cast iron figures which face out to sea, spread over a 2-mile (3.2 km) stretch of the beach between
Waterloo and
Blundellsands. Each figure is 189 cm tall (nearly 6 feet 2½ inches) and weighs around 650 kg (over 1400 lb). In common with most of Gormley's work, the figures are cast replicas of his own body. As the tides ebb and flow, the figures are, respectively, revealed and submerged by the sea.
The figures were cast at two foundries: Hargreaves Foundry in
Halifax, West Yorkshire and the Joseph and Jesse Siddons Foundry in
West Bromwich by foundryman Derek Alexander.
Another Place was first exhibited on the beach of
Cuxhaven,
Germany, in 1997 followed by
Stavanger in
Norway and
De Panne in
Belgium.
SAFETY CONCERN When the tide recedes in low tide the sand can be very muddy and you can get stuck in it. Then the mud hardens quickly and could trap you. If you get stuck during high-tide coming in then that could lead to fatal drowning. I was there in low tide times and got stuck in a Man in contemplation
You never know - he may suddenly begin to walk small mud and got my shoes and pants ruined but it could have been worse.
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