News / Cleo Lake
Statue unveiled of Bristol lord mayor
“Who’s going to be the first person to take a selfie?” asks Bristol lord mayor Cleo Lake.
She didn’t have to wait for long, with gathered guests in the lord mayor’s parlour at City Hall on Thursday afternoon taking it in turns to photograph themselves with a 35cm-high statue of Lake in her full ceremonial regalia.
“This is definitely the most surreal thing that has happened to me as lord mayor so far,” says Lake, one of 25 women across the UK who has been honoured with a statue as part of the Put Her Forward project.
The incredibly lifelike statue was 3D-printed following Lake being scanned at the University of Bristol alongside Jean Golding, the founder of Children of the 90s and also now immortalised as a miniature statue.
Put Her Forward aims to recognise living women, following research that discovered that there are more public statues of goats in the UK than of women not of royal lineage or from mythology.
Out of 925 public statues in the UK, 158 are of women and of these only 25 are of non-mythical, non-royal women. There are also more statues of people called John.
Cleo and mini Cleo
Artist Cat Harrison from Put Her Foward said that Lake’s statue is the most flamboyant of the 25 they have made, with it due to be on show at City Hall this weekend during Bristol Open Doors.
“It does look a lot like me,” Lake told Bristol24/7 after the unveiling of her statue.
“But I’m more impressed by the ethos of the project if I’m honest. It’s inspirational and it’s a great initiative.”
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