art.wikisort.org - Sculpture

The Headington Shark (proper name Untitled 1986) is a rooftop sculpture located at 2 New High Street, Headington, Oxford, England, depicting a large shark embedded head-first in the roof of a house. It was protest art, put up without permission, to be symbolic of bombs crashing into buildings.

Untitled 1986
The Headington Shark in 2007, before refurbishment
Artist	John Buckley
Year	1986
Type	Sculpture
Medium	Painted fibreglass
Dimensions	7.6 m (25 ft)
Location	Headington, Oxford

Description and location

The shark first appeared on 9 August 1986, having been commissioned by the house's owner Bill Heine, a local radio presenter.[1] The sculpture was inspired by Heine hearing American warplanes flying from Upper Heyford near Oxford on their way to bomb Libya in retaliation for its terrorist attacks on American troops, and it was put up as a protest against the bombing, as well as making a statement against nuclear weapons, with the shark being used as a metaphor for falling bombs.[2][3][4]

The shark was designed by sculptor John Buckley and constructed by Anton Castiau, a local carpenter and friend of Buckley. Heine said, "The shark was to express someone feeling totally impotent and ripping a hole in their roof out of a sense of impotence and anger and desperation... It is saying something about CND, nuclear power, Chernobyl and Nagasaki".[5] The sculpture was erected on the 41st anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki.[6]

The painted fibreglass sculpture weighs 4 long hundredweight (200 kg),[5] is 25 feet (7.6 m) long,[6] and is named Untitled 1986 (written on the gate of the house).[7] It took three months to build.[8] The structure is in deliberate contrast with its otherwise ordinary suburban setting.[7]

For the occasion of the shark's 21st anniversary in August 2007, it was renovated by the sculptor,[1] following earlier complaints about the condition of the sculpture and the house.[9]

On 26 August 2016, Heine's son Magnus Hanson-Heine bought the house in order to preserve the shark.[10] In July 2017, the original house owner was diagnosed with leukaemia,[11] which he would later die with on 2 April 2019.[12] The property has been run as an Airbnb guesthouse since 2018.[7] Magnus also runs a website for general information and inquiries about the shark.[13]

In 2022, the Oxford City Council made the sculpture a heritage site for its "special contribution" to the community, despite objection by Hanson-Heine.[4]

Council opposition

The shark was controversial when it first appeared. Oxford City Council tried to have it taken down on grounds of safety, and then on the grounds that it had not given planning permission for the shark, offering to host it at the local swimming pool instead, but there was much local support for the shark.[14] Eventually the matter was taken to the central government, where Tony Baldry, a minister in the Department of the Environment, who assessed the case on planning grounds, ruled in 1992 that the shark would be allowed to remain, as it did not result in harm to the visual amenity.[1][15]

Media appearances

Bill Heine wrote a short book about the shark, which was published in 2011.[16]

In 2013, the sculpture was the subject of an April Fools' Day story in the Oxford Mail, which announced the establishment of a fictitious £200,000 fund by Oxford City Council to support the creation of similar sculptures on the roofs of other homes in the area.[17]

In 2018, students from Oxford Brookes University created a magazine called 'The Shark', inspired by the Headington Shark.[18]

See also

• Cardiff Kook, a 2007 sculpture in California which had a shark added to it
• The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, 1991 shark-based artwork by Damien Hirst
• Sharks!, a 2020 sculpture in London

References

Further reading

• Heine, Bill (2011). The Hunting of the Shark. Oxford: Oxfordfolio. ISBN 978-0-9567405-2-6.
• Dorris Heffron as portraying Bill Heine in Oxford (1996). A Shark in the House. Toronto: Key Porter Books. ISBN 1-55013-742-5.

External links

• Headington Shark web page
• Headington Shark community page
• John Buckley sculptor website
• Bill Heine's book (August 2011) revealing why and how a shark landed on his roof
• Headington Shark, 360° panorama (QuickTime)
• Planning Appeal Decision 1 August 2005
• The government approves of this shark now. (Tom Scott)

На других языках

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- [en] Headington Shark

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[fr] Requin de Headington

Le Requin de Headington (The Headington Shark en anglais) est une sculpture située au 2 New High Street, Headington, à Oxford (Angleterre) : c'est un requin planté dans le toit de la maison située à cette adresse.

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[it] Headington Shark

L'Headington Shark (/hɛdɪŋtʌn ʃɑːk/; in lingua italiana Squalo di Headington), ufficialmente chiamato Untitled 1986[2] e conosciuto anche col nome di Oxford Shark, è una scultura di vetroresina[1] alta circa 7 metri e mezzo[2] posta sul tetto di una casa di New High Street, nel distretto di Headington, ubicato nella città britannica di Oxford.

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[ru] Хедингтонская акула

Хедингтонская акула — крышная скульптура на крыше здания по адресу Нью-Хай-стрит, дом 2, Хедингтон, Оксфорд, Англия, изображающая крупную акулу, «встроенную» головой вперёд в крышу дома.

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