LONDON STATUES

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4431, 29 August 1939, Page 3

LONDON STATUES

The announcement that a model of the projected George V. memorial has been made available to members of Parliament bears the ominous footnote: is being much criticised,” says the ‘ Manchester Guardian.’ Alas! 'will it ever be possible to produce a London statue which is not “ much criticised —usually with reason? When at last the Landseer Hons for Trafalgar Square were ready it was said that the lion which used to stand on the top of Northumberland House would not accept them as fellows, and Tainc s criticism of the column itself—“ a rat impaled on a pole ” —though sharpened bv Gallic feeling, may not have been entirely groundless. When King Edward Vll.’s memorial appeared there were not wanting those who pointed out that the King never looked his best on horseback, so that the form chosen was not of the happiest. Generations have made fun of the Albert memorial, and it is only recently that some of the young highbrows have discovered that approval of it is a new way of showing their superiority. It has been customary to give a good deal of praise to the statue of Charles I. at Charing Cross, but Mr Winans, that authority on horses, found plenty to blame in it. Allan Cunningham "made great fun of the naked statues of Westcott and Burges in St. Paul’s Cathedral, “ for no British warriors go naked into battle or wear sandals or Asiatic mantles.” And the statue of the Bishop or Calcutta, “ oore-like and apparently confirming two Indian dwarfs,” has caused a good deal of ribald comment.