A statue of Brian Haw?

IssueApril - May 2023
News by David Polden

To mark the 20th anniversary of the huge 15 February march against the Iraq war, sculptor Amanda Ward and actors Mark Rylance and Michael Culver (Amanda’s husband), have launched a campaign to raise £50,000 to install a 5½-foot statue of Christian peace activist Brian Haw opposite the Imperial War Museum in South London.

The statue is a ‘maquette’ or small-scale model. It was made in 2012 when Amanda was campaigning for a nine-foot bronze statue of Brian to be put up in Parliament Square in Central London, by the houses of parliament.

Parliament Square is where Brian spent 10 years almost continuously in a peace camp, protesting with a large display of posters against economic sanctions on Iraq, the Iraq War and UK foreign policy, until his death in 2011.

Westminster council blocked the idea of a statue in the square.