Broad Street statues get two new diverse heads

The iconic sculptures, also known as 'herms', line the railings outside the Sheldonian Theatre.

Now a pair of new heads will be temporarily mounted outside the neighbouring History of Science Museum, and represent women from different ethnic backgrounds.

The aim of the installation is to 'open up a dialogue on how public sculpture can be diversified now and into the future to better represent the modern Oxford community', following Oxford University's 2017 Diversifying Portraiture project.

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It comes after the Rhodes Must Fall campaign by Oxford University students, calling for a statue of Cecil Rhodes to be removed from Oriel College on Oxford High Street.

The campaigners, inspired by a similar protest against a statue of Rhodes at the University of Cape Town, said his colonial views and actions as Prime Minister of the Cape Colony in the 1890s made him an inappropriate figure to venerate.

Alongside the new heads on Broad Street, the university will also now be opening an interactive art installation outside the museum.

This will feature a large pink face, which visitors can walk under to hear the ‘voices’ of the busts on the railings.

Artists will be building the installation from Tuesday until Friday.

Little is known about the 13 sculpted heads, which are thought to have lined Broad Street for 350 years.

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The current heads, thought to represent ancient philosophers or emperors, are the third set of busts to occupy the space.

The public are invited to give their responses to the question ‘How can we diversify public sculpture to better represent the people in today’s University of Oxford?’ by submitting written responses through the post boxes in the plinths in front of the museum.

Ideas can also be Tweeted, using the hashtag #DiversifyingPublicSculpture, or at a free clay modelling workshop on Saturday, June 22.