LONDON – A 35-year-old mother of two became the first of 2,400 people to put herself on a pedestal in Trafalgar Square in the name of art, though an uninvited activist preceded her on to the sculpture platform.
Homemaker Rachel Wardell opened Antony Gormley’s “One Other”, a 24-hour art project that runs 100 days to October 14th and involves randomly chosen people standing for an hour on the Fourth Plinth, the vacant platform in Trafalgar Square that the mayor of London fills each year in an art contest. Wardel’s opening act was briefly disrupted by anti-smoking campaigner Stuart Holmes, who acrobatically scaled the netting around the plinth and, once on it, held up a banner that read “Save the Children: Ban Tobacco and Actors Smoking”.
“We may have lost the people’s princess, but we have the people’s plinth,” said mayor Boris Johnson while the campaigner was still on the platform.
Asked his thoughts on the potential for nude participants, he said he felt “generally tolerant of nudity, provided it’s tastefully done”.
Wardell, from Sleaford in central England, wore a T-shirt showing a gagged child, and held a lollipop-shaped placard advertising the helpline for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.
Next up was 41-year-old nurse Jason Clark, who stood with his hands in his pockets in a red T-shirt and army-green Bermudas, looking statuesque. He also took pictures and waved at the crowd. – (Bloomberg)