Many people in Glasgow are very het up at the moment. It is to do with the news that the City Fathers want to raise the height of the plinth of the Duke of Wellington's statue in the city centre so that miscreants cannot climb up and place a traffic cone on his worthy head. "It's disrespectfull!"
That is true ... but over and above that, it is so very Glasgow! It is just another manifestation of how people in Glasgow are very quick to see through pretension... whether in private conversation or in public places. Does that make this statue, which is a very fine example of ART, pretentious?
Well, they say Art should engage people and, my goodness, this horse and his rider certainly do. This photo above I took several years ago. It made me laugh!
So I go back occasionally and have a look when I am in city centre. For example, I took this shot last month. I thought, "Ah yes... all is right with the world; the Chooky's still got his Hat on!" In fact, now that I look at it, there are actually 2 cones. I guess it is like Ladies of the West End ... they wear hats (or used to) to functions. As I recall, one lady had a plastic fold-out rain hat tied over her colourful felt hat she was wearing.
On the plinth the bas-relief on one side of the base had an additional feature which one doesn't normally see.
These 2 shots were taken recently. It shows the statue looking outwards (east) along Ingram Street Queen Street Station is on the left.
Some of the newspaper headlines are really funny. A Glasgow expression often
heard is to do with one person asking another (say a wife saying to her husband who
has moved the beach towel up the beach) "Ya Gonny No Do That?"!! So
one headline is (by the newspaper targeting the City Fathers), "Ya Coney No Do
That?"!
And ... in the end ... I see in the papers today: they have withdrawn their plan.
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