Another Place

18th March 2006

On Saturday last week, Gav and I drove from his parents' house in Hoylake over to Crosby, where sculptor Antony Gormley has one of his installations. Another Place is 100 cast iron figures, supposedly based on his own body, facing out to sea along a 2-mile stretch of Crosby beach. It was first exhibited on a beach in Germany in 1997 and has been moving around ever since.

I didn't really know much about it and had only heard of Antony Gormley very recently, although I had heard of his Angel Of The North before. I have to say I think Another Place is a lot more aesthetically pleasing! We happened to go to Crosby on a really beautiful day, which no doubt helped. It's a really pretty beach, stretches on for miles with lovely sand dunes along the top. Peggy, the Bates' dog, certainly seemed to enjoy herself!

The only annoying thing was that the figures were placed much further apart than I'd thought and my poor little point-and-shoot camera could never fit more than one in a picture at a time, which is a shame because it really was quite a spectacular sight to look into the distance and just see all these very human-like figures standing all along the beach as far as the eye could see. I think they're all the same height but they are placed at varying distances from the shore, some of them have sand up their knees, others are in the water up to their necks, making it seem quite eerie at times. I can't quite decide if the figures were looking hopeful, despondent, peaceful or desperate. But it was somehow beautiful.


Anyway, before I go all arty-farty, it was nice. Nice beach, nice walk, nice day!

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