Royal Beasts at the Tower - Completed by Weekend Elephant

This week's Weekend Elephant came from the Tower of London. The first person to correctly identify the location was Matt, he of that encyclopaedic London resource the Londonist.  Congratulations! An honourable mention to Marc too for providing the most complete answer, thank you!

The elephant is by sculptor Kendra Haste and was installed last Monday at the QEII gate.

 

The elephant completes her excellent series of wire animal sculptures, produced for the Tower of London's Royal Beasts exhibition. I have blogged about this exhibition several times now. The first animals installed in April were the lions, in May came baboons and the polar bear. Later in May some more baboons were introduced and I wrote about some of the missed opportunities of the exhibition.

Now at last the exhibition is complete. I think Kendra Haste's sculptures are magnificent and have visited them as they arrive about a dozen times. I am a member of Historic Royal Palaces so I can nip in and see them whenever I like and I don't have to queue. Whether I would make a special journey if I was not a member and pay £19.80 each time to see this very small exhibition is highly unlikely. However if I had never visited the Tower before I would probably enjoy this additional temporary attraction.

For locals that haven't seen the exhibition and would like to, I would suggest that a year's membership is probably the best bet. That way you can nip in and out avoiding the crowds and you get to do the same at Hampton Court, Banqueting House, Kensington and Kew Palace's too. Annual membership is £43 so if you only visit a Palace or two it will soon pay for itself. Details of individual and family membership from HRP website can be found here.

Royal Beasts at the Tower - Opportunities Missed

The new Kendra Haste Baboons have arrived at the Tower of London in time to mark today's official "opening" of the summer's Royal Beasts exhibition.

The baboons are magnificent and now join a fellow baboon, a polar bear and the three lions at the entrance. I have posted on all these before, click on the Kendra Haste label for images.

However the elephant will not be installed until July and the original commission was for 13 animals. Even when the elephant is installed there will only be 9 animals in place. Will the other 4 ever be displayed?

Historic Royal Palaces have already started promoting the exhibition but it is far from complete. With a standard adult ticket now costing £19.80 and a child's ticket £10.45, I think this is grossly unfair.

The exhibition on the fascinating story of the Royal Menagerie's history dating back to 1255 is actually very small indeed. You can read almost all the text direct from the website and the only real exhibits are Kendra Haste's wonderful wire animals.

Due to the inflexible attitude of staff one cannot even go straight to the exhibition up the Jewel House stairs to the Brick Tower but must backtrack, some distance, to the entrance of the East Wall Walk first. I can understand the one-way, conveyor belt system when the Tower is busy but today I was there at 9.30am and nobody at all was using the broad staircase I wanted to go up. I was however able to visit the shop a few yards away using a similar staircase. H&S rules are different if you are purchasing souvenirs apparently.

Inside the shop I checked to see if there was any merchandise connected with the exhibition. There was nothing. Were there any books I might have liked to purchase about the Tower Menagerie? No. Not even copies of Daniel Hahn's interesting "The Tower Menagerie" let alone a brand new work to tie in with the exhibition. When any other museum or gallery puts on a new show the bookshop is usually filled with items related to the exhibition. HRP buying policy is peverse.

Needless to say there is nothing about the artist who has provided the only valid reason for visiting the exhibition - Kendra Haste. No video, no biography panel, no photo, zilch.

Signage to the exhibition is either non-existent or is so poor that I didn't see it. The animals themselves stand with no interpretation boards nearby. You can see bemused visitors just glancing at them, unaware of why they are there at all.

Of course the Tower of London is a magnificent, must see, place in its own right. Nearly £20 is probably a fair price for a full day visit. But £20 for a very small exhibition promoted like a blockbuster at the RA, The British Museum and The Wellcome is far too steep. All the above not only display far many more exhibits, they document their exhibitions superbly and their book and gift shops are full of genuinely interesting connected merchandise. All the above are also far cheaper and in the Wellcome's case completely free.

If you have never been to the Tower, then do so and I am sure you will have a great day, check the sculptures as you walk around. I really wouldn't want to put you off.

If you have been before, are not a member and particularly want to see this exhibition then I really would give it a miss until at least July when the life-size elephant arrives.You can do the whole exhibition in 20 mins.

Such a shame,a fantastic story to tell, superb new sculptures to accompany the history and yet the whole thing has fallen flat. As I left the Tower, a bus plastered with the exhibition posters passed me and I felt really cross.

I will post the elephant when it arrives and note any improvements that have been made.

A Single Baboon does not a Menagerie Make

I went again to the Tower of London in search of Kendra Haste's superb, life-sized, wire mesh animals that have been specially commissioned for this summer's exhibition on the Tower's Menagerie.

I was a bit disappointed to find that all the animals, which will soon include an Elephant and a Polar Bear, have yet to be installed.

I did get another shot of the pride of Lions, this time from from inside the Tower.

And I did get to see her fantastic new Baboon.

But if I had needed to pay for a ticket I would have been more than mildly disappointed. If anyone is planning to go especially to see the Kendra Haste sculptures then wait a little. I will post all the animals as they are added to the exhibition.

Tower of London Lions

I went to the Tower of London yesterday with the intention of seeing Kendra Haste's new menagerie of animals for the summer exhibition. The holiday queues put me off. However, I was pleased to see that her lions are positioned outside the Tower and can be seen for free just near the entrance.

I'll wait until next week to snap the other animals.

Kendra Haste's Lions Join Her Waterloo Elephant

Glad to see that Kendra Haste has produced a pride of lions, amongst other creatures, for the Tower of London's summer exhibition on the history of the Tower's Menagerie. Her wire sculptures are incredible. She also produced a wire elephant a few years ago, for a temporary exhibition at Gloucester Road tube and it was purchased by LT for Waterloo Station. It is still there, standing above the main entrance to the Underground.

I haven't seen the lions in person yet, maybe I'll visit them this week. In the meantime there are pictures on her website here.

The Father of the Lions and that Lion's Father

After an interesting comment on a previous lion post by ChrisP yesterday, I went off in search of the stone original of the lions in Dover Street and elsewhere. Just as Chris said, there it was at the Royal British Society of Sculptors, Old Brompton Road. Thank you again for the information.

As I was in the area, I went off to get a picture of the Stevens statue on the South facade of the V&A. En route I passed this!

Yes, yet another version, this one larger than the Dover Street and the Law Society lions. He is one of several, high up on the railings outside the Natural History Museum on Cromwell Road. A couple of minutes later and I was at the V&A.

This is the creator of the lions, Alfred Stevens (1817-75) portrayed by James Gamble, looking out onto Cromwell Road from the V&A. I felt quite pleased by now, I had snapped the original lion, another related lion on a prestigious institution's railings and the statue of their creator. So I wandered home, via a pub and saw this.

A modern concrete copy of the same lion, one of a pair, guarding the entrance to a garage in Chelsea. I feel sure I will be seeing more of the same now I have started this! I will post only the notable ones.

Wheeler's Greatest Challenge

I was recently given a copy of "High Relief" the autobiography of Sir Charles Wheeler the sculptor. The cover shows him working on "Earth", one of his massive figures at the Ministry of Defence in London.

The biggest challenge of his career was not carving the monumental MOD figures but rather producing two far more modest lion heads, that support the balcony at India House in Aldwych.

They were carved from Swedish black granite and he writes "So hard was the stone that I kept a boy running from studio to smithy so that my chisels could be remade after a dozen or so blows for they then became quite blunt."

High relief: The autobiography of Sir Charles Wheeler, sculptor

The Law Society Lions have Brothers in Dover Street

The lions outside the British Museum moved on in 1896. A small and well known pride are to be found outside the Law Society in Chancery Lane.

A less well known splinter-pride are in Dover Street outside Ely House.

 

All these lions are related, they were made for the British Museum's railings by Alfred George Stevens. Still more can be found at the Wellington monument in St Paul's Cathedral. The BM didn't want them so they ended up being purchased by all sorts of people. These are the "Lions Sejan" produced by the artist around 1852. The Victoria and Albert Museum also have an example here.

Has anybody else got details of other groups?