It’s Friday, the dark side of statues and monuments have been in the news all week so how about balancing that out with some of your favourites, grand or modest, well known or obscure. Here’s a couple to get us started:

Yuri Gagarin, Moscow. Is there a more space age statue than this?

Another Russian monument but this one commemorates the services to science of laboratory mice.

I’ve never seen that Gagarin statue before but it’s brilliant. A fabulous mix of kitsch Russian propoganda, art deco (shades of Metropolis) and true heroism.

The Winged Victory of Samothrace …. Nike

I like that Gagarin one too.

Putting what they symbolise and their politics aside North Korea has pretty impressive statues.

There’s some fascinating stuff here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memento_Park

Perhaps that’s what the mercans should do with all theirs.

Related, but Stirling Castle has some brilliant gargoyles that make me smile.

Love that Gargarin statue, always liked futurist stuff.

I liked these in Sarlat, in the Dordogne…

I like this one.

You know those guys who paint themselves bronze and stand still. I am absolute certain I saw one of them in a scrapyard in Leith at around 2 in the morning. I was very tired though, I could dreamed it, but if it was real it was very clever.

Not seen it in the concrete as it were but this one always looks impressive:

Lion de Belfort – ’tis very impressive

Mine will either be:

Genghis Khan Equestrian Statue

and/or

Angel of the North

Hercules, in a garden in Herculaneum

Don’t really know how to describe it, Naples Archeological Museum, recovered from either Pompeii or Herculaneum

Farnese Bull, Naples Archeological Museum

Veiled Christ, Capello di San Severano, Naples

One for the geeks from when I was in SF the other week…

Rachel

just looking through a google for Glasgow statues there, tbh none really peak my interest. But i’v never seen this in the flesh as i’m just not up that way, but I like this, monument to rottenrow maternity. i was born there so I’m claiming this as a monumnent to me! 😆 I like the simplicity!

oo oo oo – I forgot my favourite! Spotted at the side of the road last year as I was riding down through Italy.

Rachel

Is that a titty totem?

[architectural pedant] @matt_oab. Those aren’t gargoyles, those are grotesques. Gargoyles incorporate a water spout [/architectural pedant]

Lobey Dosser and El Fideldo

Is that a titty totem?

It certainly appears to be! Was really surreal riding along some minor road and then thinking “did I just see what I thought I saw??”. Just had to turn around and take a picture. No plaque or other explanation of what on earth the sculptor was thinking.

Somehow, I love it!

Rachel

Obviously, this one….

I show my daughter this one all the time.

If you’re going to do it, go big

…and Dan, champion of the ashet pie with a pastry lid

Always a favourite of mine…

from the cover of closer

Lol, Rich_s.

Statue, not statute!

[url=https://flic.kr/p/4jWAnD]tongariki[/url] by Evil Goat, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/4k1DzU]moo[/url] by Evil Goat, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/4k1DMh]heads[/url] by Evil Goat, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/4k1C7y]Anakena[/url] by Evil Goat, on Flickr

This really is spectacular up close. Don’t go see the plastercast, go see the original.

And these..

And this because it offended so many people (Catholics mainly)

Reminds me of going to watch Leicester as a young lad. Always walked past it and was fascinated with the building.

@ton the I was reminded of the Meadowhall one by this in Edmonton MAll.

This one is (or was) in Aberdeen Art Gallery, I enjoy how incongruous it seems in that context:

(not my photo)

In Guangzhou, China. One of the main commercial walkways. My own photo 🙂
Cheers!
I.

Hoover Dam

I love many statues, and when I actually take the time to stop and consider public pieces, find that there is more good stuff out there than we often realise.

That said, especially in contemporary terms, there is something special about almost everything by Antony Gormley. I find his work very haunting.

The first time I saw Angel of the North, it came upon me unexpectedly as I drove down the A1, and it quite literally took my breath away.