| Tim Tolkien | |
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Sentinel near the Jaguar works in Castle Bromwich, formerly the Spitfire factory |
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| Born | 1962 |
| Nationality | English |
| Field | Sculpture |
| Works | Sentinel |
Tim Tolkien (born 1962) is an English sculptor who has designed several monumental sculptures, including the award-winning Sentinel.
His other claim to fame is as the great-nephew of J. R. R. Tolkien, the famous author of the fantasy book The Lord of the Rings (Tim Tolkien is the grandson of Hilary Tolkien, the younger brother of J. R. R. Tolkien). Tim Tolkien has a wood carving and metal sculpture business at Cradley Heath, West Midlands. He is also a bass player and member of the band Klangstorm, founded in 1996.
Tim was raised in the village of Hughenden Valley, near High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire and, with his two brothers, Stephen and Nick attended the local Royal Grammar School. Several large canvasses painted by Tim still graced the school's corridors for many years after he left. He graduated with a degree in fine art (sculpture) from Reading University in 1981.
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Sentinel is Tolkien's most famous work to date. In 1996, he was appointed by CAN [1] who were awarded the contract to develop public art proposals for the estate using National Lottery money, as an artist in residence to help with regeneration of the Castle Vale estate in Birmingham. The following year, he consulted with residents about an art project for the entrance to the estate. They favoured a sculpture featuring Spitfires, reflecting the area's flying history. The large steel and aluminium Sentinel Spitfire sculpture was the result, showing three Spitfires peeling off up into the air in different directions. It was unveiled in October 2000, near the former factory which built them, by their former test pilot Alex Henshaw.
Tolkien also sculpted a memorial to the actor Sir Cedric Hardwicke, at the latter's birthplace of Lye, West Midlands, for Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council. The memorial takes the form of a giant filmstrip, the illuminated cut metal panels illustrating scenes from some of Sir Cedric's best-known roles, which include The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Shape of Things to Come, and The Ghost of Frankenstein. It was unveiled in November 2005.
His proposals for a 20-foot high statue of Treebeard, an Ent from The Lord of the Rings, to be erected on the Green at Moseley, near J. R. R. Tolkien's childhood home in Birmingham, have met with some controversy, but permission for its erection - scheduled for May 2007 - has been granted by Birmingham City Council.
He has also worked with the singer and television presenter Toyah Willcox, designing her armour-like stage costumes and, in 2005, making a documentary film for BBC2, comparing New Zealand's successful exploitation of its movie-related J. R. R. Tolkien associations, with that of J.R.R.'s (and Toyah's) home town, Birmingham.
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