The Angel of the North is a contemporary sculpture, designed by Antony Gormley, which is located in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England.
It is a steel sculpture of an angel, standing 20 metres (66 ft) tall, with wings measuring 54 metres (177 ft) across.[1] The wings themselves are not planar, but are angled 3.5º forward, which Gormley used to create "a sense of embrace".[2]
It stands on a hill on the southern edge of Low Fell, overlooking the A1 and A167 roads into Tyneside, and the East Coast Main Line rail route, south of the site of Team Colliery.[3]
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Work began on the project in 1994 and cost £1 million. Most of the project funding was provided by the National Lottery. The Angel was finished on 16 February 1998.
Due to its exposed location, the sculpture was built to withstand winds of over 100 mph (160 km/h). Thus, 600 tonnes of concrete were used to create foundations which anchor the sculpture to rock 70 feet (21 m) below. The sculpture was built at Hartlepool Steel Fabrications Ltd using Corten weather resistant steel. It was made in three parts—with the body weighing 100 tonnes and two wings weighing 50 tonnes each—then brought to its site by road. It took five hours for the body to be transported from its construction site in Hartlepool, up the A19 road to the site.[4]
The Angel aroused some controversy in British newspapers, at first, including a "Gateshead stop the statue" campaign,[5] while local councillor Martin Callanan was especially strong in his opposition. However, it has since been considered to be a landmark for the Northeast of England[4][6] and has been listed by one organisation as an "Icon of England".[7] It has often been used in film and television to represent Tyneside, as are other local landmarks such as the Tyne Bridge and the Gateshead Millennium Bridge.
The sculpture is known locally as the "Gateshead Flasher", because of its location and appearance.[8] The sculpture was decorated in 1998 by fans of the Newcastle United football team who paid tribute to local hero Alan Shearer by putting a giant team shirt over the Angel, complete with Shearer's name and famous number 9. In the 2000 film Purely Belter the angel (misidentified as female) is invoked as the "guardian angel of fucking toe-rags".
Several maquettes were produced during the development stage of the project.[9] A man-sized model from which the sculpture was created was sold at auction for £2 million in July 2008.[10] An additional bronze maquette used in fundraising in the 1990s, owned by Gateshead Council, was valued at £1 million on the BBC show Antiques Roadshow on 16 November 2008. This was the most valuable item ever appraised on the programme.[9][11]
Inspired by the Angel of the North, several similar projects have been proposed. The 'Angel of the South' title has been given by some to the Willow Man which sits to the side of the M5 in Somerset, while a project, informally named the Angel of the South, has been proposed in Ebbsfleet, Kent. The sculpture Brick Man (also by Gormley) was proposed for the Holbeck area of Leeds.