Man with Fish

I was commissioned by the Countryside Commission for Scotland to make a sculpture for their garden at the Glasgow Garden Festival…

The Countryside Commission for Scotland was set up in 1968 to protect and develop Scotland’s natural heritage. An important area of their work was concerned with educating and encouraging young people to look after Scotland’s rural areas and resources. I made ‘Man with fish’ for their garden in the Glasgow Garden Festival very much with young people in mind. It shows a young man with a Mohican haircut in the shape of a large green fish. The fish is really his thoughts and meditations, which bleed into his stone body to influence his future actions.

After the Garden Festival had finished, Man with Fish was relocated to the John Muir country park near Dunbar. And there he stands to this day, in among the tall reeds that surround a small loch…

Vincent Bonnar (standing in a rowing boat) beside the sculpture on installation day 1988