Turn any corner and you never know what you might meet with. At some juncture, over presumably a glass of something, a plan was hatched between two friends, to simply cut (although easier than it sounds) a whopping big hole in a previously sealed roof, then punch through a distorted vision with the help of some fibreglass. All this without any permission sought from the bureaucratic authority. It’s anarchic birth definitely matching the harrowing sight.
This view back in 1986 as now, is one of hysterical madness and yet I cannot help but smile upon each glance at both the lunacy and creativity. Every time I swerve down the London Road through suburban Oxford, I cannot help by crane my neck when passing this particular road, always asking myself the same question ‘Is it still there?’.
The day I clicked this pic, two elderly ladies (on their way to the local shops) quizzed me as to what I thought of the 7 metre fish sticking aloft from a regular Victorian terrace on what would otherwise be a perfectly normal street scene. I replied - with perhaps a little too much haste - that I admired its quirkiness, although withholding internal reservations as to how it dealt with high winds. The first of the two racing to express thoughts of horror at the ‘monstrosity’ existing at all, the other willing it expunged from the roof with immediacy. I admired the candour, but didn’t wholly agree with this mauling by local residents. Like all works of art, the marmite effect ensues; some have described as ‘bringing excitement to the street’ and others citing its lack of harmony. If I had the gall, I would have surely knocked on a neighbours door to find their expressions to what loomed large over their sitting room window.
In an age of planning consent minefields, oh how I would’ve liked to have been in on that particular council chamber meeting, when deciding how best to deal with this protruding shark.
To add further oddness to its origins, it was intended to be dropped in place on August 6th - to coincide with the atomic bomb being dropped on Hiroshima, however in the end the story unfolds that due to logistics it took until August 9th to see it (quite literally) fall into place - this time the date syncing with the bombing of Nagasaki. I not overly keen on the grim semblance, but I get the idea about the delivery of a falling object.
Sadly, the fella whose vision saw the shark plummet Into their grey Victorian slates has since departed this earth, but their legacy lives on. I’ve occasionally wondered if there is buried in the loft space, a face attached to the shark, and whether it has a wry smile at all the attention its tail is getting, or perhaps, slightly perplexed at where it now finds itself wedged?
Headington Shark