Visualisation of how Eduardo Paolozzi's Oscar Wilde
sculpture will look when installed in Chelsea
A new sculpture of Oscar Wilde - or, more precisely, of the Irish playwright's head cast in black bronze, lying on its side and sliced into segments - has been condemned by his grandson, Merlin Holland, on the grounds that it fails to adequately convey Wilde's genius and is, from a purely aesthetic perspective, absolutely hideous (his words, not mine) [1].
I have to say, Holland's criticism of the work, which is based on a maquette by the late Eduardo Paolozzi [2] - one of the most seminal British artists of the post-war era and a pioneer of Pop Art - seems rather ridiculous. And the fact that he should describe the work as unacceptable is troubling.
Holland may know more about his grandfather, whose life he has researched and written about extensively, than anybody else, but he has failed to appreciate that Paolozzi's cubo-surrealist sculpture is not meant to be a lifelike representation, nor is it attempting to capture Wilde's joie de vivre.
Actually, the piece is very much in line with other sculptural works by Paolozzi; see for example his piece entitled The Head of Invention (1989), located at the entrance of the Design Museum in Kensington - click here - and if one were to criticise the Wilde sculpture it would be on the grounds that one has seen this kind of thing before.
In sum: it lacks uniqueness, but it's not gloomy or hideous and it's certainly better than the hilariously bad memorial statue of Wilde by Danny Osborne located in Dubin's Merrion Square - click here - though not as challenging as Maggi Hambling's A Conversation with Oscar Wilde (1998), which can be found off the Strand in London, in which the playwright rises from the dead, cigarette in hand: click here.
If Paolozzi's work tells us more about him than it does Wilde - and I admit it probably does - I can see this might be an issue for some, including Wilde's grandson. But that doesn't trouble me as an admirer of both men and, besides, our task ultimately is to learn to appreciate the piece as an object in its own right and not as something tied to a human subject.
Notes
[1] I'm quoting from the article by Dalya Alberge entitled '"Absolutely hideous": new London sculpture of Oscar Wilde condemned by his grandson', in The Guardian (21 September 2024): click here.
[2] In 1995, Paolozzi along with eleven other invited artists submitted a design for a statue of Oscar Wilde to a committee chaired by Sir Jeremy Isaacs. The committee, of which Merlin Holland was a member, eventually shortlisted six candidates, including Paolozzi, and requested they create maquettes (i.e., scale models). Ultimately, Paolozzi's design was rejected as too brutalist and the committee chose Maggi Hambling's more playful (if somewhat macabre) sculpture.
