A giant bronze thumbs up is the latest piece to grace London’s Fourth Plinth - its long thumb raised to unnatural heights.
But it’s fair to say the latest addition to Trafalgar Square, created by Macclesfield-born David Shrigley, has been met on social media by both thumbs pointed up and thumbs pointed down.
The seven-metre high, 4.5 tonnes bronze work, called Really Good, is the 11th original commission to grace the space - and four metres of it are just thumb.
Shrigley, who was born in Macclesfield but now lives in Glasgow, is a master of satire, known for his quick-witted drawings and his tragicomic take on the everyday.
He has applied this in the wider world already, most notably in his unforgettable design for Partick Thistle F.C.’s unconventional mascot Kingsley.
Not everyone is on board. But commissioning artist Jeremy Deller and the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, are among those who have given the work a massive thumbs up.
David, 45, has described the work as “slightly satirical but also serious at the same time” and said he hoped the positivity of the thumb gesture would become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Explaining Really Good, the information panel offers: “Shrigley’s ambition is that this simple gesture will become a self-fulfilling prophecy: that things considered ‘bad’ such as the economy, the weather, and society, will benefit from a change of consensus towards positivity.”
The sculpture is considered a savagely modern work using a most common symbol of affirmation on most social media platforms, yet which still pays tribute to the past, cast in the same dark patina as the other statues on the square.
The commissioning panel behind the art on the plinth are used to causing a stir, having already given a temporary home to Katharina Fritsch’s bright blue chicken Hahn/Cock, Hans Haacke’s skeletal and political Gift Horse, Marc Quinn’s controversial Alison Lapper Pregnant, and Antony Gormley’s living work One & Other - a group of 2,400 people who each stood alone on the plinth for an hour.
