Tonight at 8pm, Nicola will come face to face with the Messenger sculpture for the first time, when the sculpture is publicly unveiled at the Theatre Royal Plymouth in Devon UK. This evening the huge black awning that is currently completely covering the Messenger sculpture will be removed to reveal the sculpture for the first time without any fencing, strapping or supports.
Tonight will be the sculpture’s public opening and will be preceded with speeches by Joseph Hillier artist and creator of the sculpture and Adrian Vinken director of the Theatre Royal Plymouth who commissioned the sculpture.
Nicola inspired the sculptor Joseph Hillier with a split-second pose struck by an actor during rehearsals for Othello, Theatre Royal Plymouth’s award-winning and explosive co-production with Frantic Assembly in 2014. Joseph created the sculpture by taking 3D scans of Nicola’s body as she was poised before bursting forward into the choreographed chaos of the play. Although gargantuan in scale, the pose of the sculpture is small, crouched and loaded with the potential to spring forward at any moment.
Commissioned by TRP as a monument to the power of creativity and the arts, the sculpture created by British artist Joseph Hillier catches a young female actor mid-performance, embodying the energy and creativity at the heart of the Theatre Royal and cultural life in Plymouth.
