Soho sculptures are soulless gimmicks 

• I WAS sketching a sculpture that’s in one of the streets off Soho Square, (see above).

Meanwhile I had to consider the paucity of sculpture around Soho.

The lump of rock that is supposed to be Charles II sits, like a curse, in the very middle of Soho Square.

It’s hideous. Perhaps, in Dorian Gray-style, it sums up the vicious soul of that duplicitous Stuart king.

Modern sculpture tends to hate beauty. Instead of grace and joy, we have gimmicks without soul.

The sole exception in the West End is Alfred Gilbert’s flying naked boy in Piccadilly Circus.

It was controversial in its time. Gilbert was quite an otherworldly figure; he sold his stuff at knock-down prices, and gave much away.

The result was that he went bankrupt, he was drummed out of the RA, and he was forced into exile across the Channel.

Still, his “Eros” (Anteros) looks as daring as ever. Gilbert, through this work, says that art is about emotion, above all.

And how appropriate his cute and naughty Eros would appear, if relocated to Soho, which calls itself London’s capital of love!

ZEKRIA IBRAHIMI
Mackenzie Close, W12