ART

It's hardly likely to storm the bestseller charts, but a new book about statues and sculptures in Bristol deserves a place of honour on the bookshelves of anyone with half an interest in the city's heritage and culture, says Eugene Byrne.

‘Public Sculpture of Bristol’ by Douglas Merritt and Francis Greenacre with Katherine Eustace is a monumental work (heh! See what I did there?). It's been 15 years in the making and contains an astonishing amount of information on 3D art round town, from medieval carvings through to the most recent stuff.

This is great if you're a fine art luvvie. All the technical detail, the who-made-it-out-of-what-and-who-paid-for-it stuff is all there, but the real pleasure is in the incidental detail and gossip. So did you know, for instance, that the guy who made the Queen Victoria statue on College Green died in mysterious circumstances, but it was all hushed up because he was seeing (possibly in the Biblical sense) one of the Queen's daughters? Or that the bust of Samuel Plimsoll that used to be down Cumberland Basin, and is now on Capricorn Quay, opposite the ss Great Britain, probably isn't of Plimsoll at all? Or that there are (at least) two representations of 'Bristol', or the spirit thereof represented by a lady who looks a lot like Britannia, only she has a castle for a crown?

For all the fun, it remains a rigorously scholarly work. The only let-down is the lack of colour photography due to budgetary constraints. It was produced for the Public Monuments and Sculpture Association (PMSA) by Douglas Merritt, former professor of graphic design at UWE, and by Francis Greenacre, former curator of fine art at Bristol City Museum. There's also an essay on church monuments by Katherine Eustace, a founder of the PMSA.

What made it such a huge task was the vast amount of sculptures that Bristol has, particularly once you take things in churches, graveyards and cemeteries into account. There are also some things in private or semi-private spaces which are so important that they have to be included anyway, such as the Boer War monument at Clifton College. Very few grave monuments are included purely for reasons of space, though the really important ones are there, such as the Indian-style tomb of the Rajah Rammohun Roy at Arnos Vale, and a monument carved by Eric Gill in Canford Cemetery in Westbury-on-Trym. "It's a fairly arbitrary decision process," says Greenacre. "If you had too many rules and regulations, things would be in which would bore you to short sobs, and things would be left out which would be really important."

Greenacre's favourites? "I stick with the idea that the Rysbrack [statue of William III on horseback] in Queen Square is the finest equestrian monument in northern Europe. I have no trouble with that. In its time it was the most famous piece of sculpture in England. It was enormously popular.

"But it's the later and more incidental things which are special to Bristol, and some of the regeneration schemes. Such as Water Jack in Oxford Street in the Dings, that's excellent. Perhaps the last item date-wise is Jason Lane's 'Great Crested Plunger' in Ashley Road. He also did the guard dog out at Blaise Castle, a particularly problematic spot where a lot of vandalism has taken place and he's come up with something which is humorous and – hopefully – unbreakable. Those are nice modern moments."

Caterpillar by Rodney Harris, Clifton Place Community Garden, Stapleton Road, Easton The same garden also featured another work by the same artist, a big woodlouse, also made of bricks. It was stolen last August.

Beside the Still Waters by Peter Randall-Page, Castle Park (1993)  Installed in a joint initiative by Bristol City Council and Arnolfini to improve the park.

The Greater Crested Plunger, the Crested Columbus Plunger and the Hooked Beaked Bantom by Jason Lane, Ashley Road/Grosvenor Road Junction, St Pauls (2008)  "Besides their wit, they also combine imagination with the most accomplished craftsmanship," Francis Greenacre says. "An absolute delight. That's community sculpture working. It's secure in a subtle, clever way, and it's fun."

‘PUBLIC SCULPTURE OF BRISTOL’ BY DOUGLAS MERRITT AND FRANCIS GREENACRE, WITH KATHARINE EUSTACE, IS PUBLISHED BY LIVERPOOL UNIVERSITY PRESS, £30 PAPERBACK/£60 HARDBACK. PUBLIC MONUMENTS & SCULPTURE ASSOCIATION WWW.PMSA.ORG.UK

Copyright Eugene Byrne 2011

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