Another Place

For John Plummer


After lengthy negotiations between

Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council

and Another Place Ltd, the cast iron

statues that comprise the installation,

‘Another Place’, will be removed from the beach.

A third of the statues is completely

submerged. At a high water a third more

disappear, and those, nearest what remains

of the sand dunes, show only their heads.

The hundred figures, all cast from a mould

of the naked body of the artist,

Sir Antony Gormley, will be erected

along the perimeter of a nearby

golf course the Council acquired under

the Global Warming Mitigation Act.

The barnacles, which adhere to the statues,

will in time, it is anticipated, drop off.

A spokesperson for the artist explained

that the protracted negotiations focussed

on which direction the statues would face.

A compromise was reached whereby some would face

south towards Liverpool’s two cathedrals

high up at either end of Hope Street;

some north towards Southport’s hinterland

and the flooded fields of the Fylde’s coastal plain;

and some still westwards towards what used to be

the ambiguous promise of the oceans.

Before the installation of the art work

the beach was seldom visited – unsafe

for swimming, a rudimentary car park

beside the Coastguard Station, no toilets.

The occasional dog-walker might note

the profusion of razor clams, or specks

of coal, scattered among the seaweed, from seams

at Point of Ayr on the distant Welsh coast.

The influx of visitors required

a tarmacked car park and proper toilets –

both frequently inundated now.

The Coastguard Station is on twenty foot piles.

Crosby Beach is seven miles or so

from the centre of Liverpool, most of which

was razed in the May Blitz of ’41.

Much of the rubble was dumped on the beach,

cordoned off from the public throughout the war.

The detritus is so wind-swept and now sea-swept

that it resembles pebbles spring tides have cast –

except for the tell-tale clay of a brick,

a fragment of cut stone.

Note: ANOTHER PLACE – Sylvia Selzer: https://www.sylviaselzer.com/2014/08/17/another-place/