OBJECTIVES

The PMSA aims to heighten public appreciation of Britain's public sculpture, and to contribute to its preservation, protection and promotion. It seeks to achieve this through several projects that include: the National Recording Project, the Sculpture Journal, Save our Sculpture and the Marsh Award for Public Sculpture. The PMSA is a registered charity, which relies on the voluntary work of its members. Its many projects and publications are funded by subscriptions and by the generosity of a number of individuals, institutions and grant-giving bodies. Established in 1991, it aims to bring together individuals and organisations with a mutual interest in public sculpture and monuments, their production, preservation and history. The Association seeks to encourage public awareness of Britain's monumental heritage - past, present and future - through activities, publications and dialogue; and it campaigns for listing, preservation, protection and restoration. The current time-span, beginning from around the Stuart period, extends to new commissions of the present day and also includes the three 13th century Eleanor Crosses that survive in Geddington, Hardingstone and Waltham Cross, as well as other medieval work still surviving in public places.

Download an information sheet about the PMSA by clicking here

THE ORGANISATION AND THE FOUNDING MEMBERS

President His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester, KG, GCVO

Chairman Peter Brown

Deputy Chairmen Benedict Read, FSA / Ian Leith, FSA

Executive Committee Ian Leith, FSA; Dr Margaret Garlake, Jolyon Drury

Trustees Jolyon Drury, Dr Margaret Garlake, Adrian Glew (Archive Consultant), Martin Israel (Hon. Treasurer), Ian Leith, Stuart Lochhead, Benedict Read, Derek Pullen (Conservation Advisor), Co-opted: Lee Stewart (Membership Secretary), Tom Read (NRP Financial Adviser).

Sculpture Journal Editor Katharine Eustace, FSA

Founding Patron Sir Eduardo Paolozzi, CBE, RA

The PMSA's founding members were Jo Darke (formerly PMSA Chief Executive), with the writer, lecturer and broadcaster Paul Atterbury, Ian Leith of the National Monuments Record, and Catherine Moriarty, then Co-ordinator of the National Inventory of War Memorials which was founded in 1989 to create a database of war memorials throughout the UK.

From the beginning, the PMSA was actively encouraged by the writer and sculpture scholar Benedict Read, and by Andrew and Janet Naylor, metal sculpture conservators. Subscriptions were opened in May 1991 and membership has now stabilised at around 250. Since 1991, the PMSA has initiated the National Recording Project and collaborated with the publishers Liverpool University Press on the acclaimed series 'Public Sculpture of Britain', and has established the much respected bi-annual Sculpture Journal. It has set up events, conferences and publications in collaboration with English Heritage, the UK Institute of Conservators, University College Dublin and many other similar institutions. The PMSA operates an advisory service and distributes newsletters and newsheets to its members.

Other projects include collaboration with a number of organisations and individuals to oversee production of the 'Custodians Handbook', published in 2005 and occasionally updated. It was designed to give guidance to families and individuals who inherit sculptors' works, studios, archives and memorabilia. The campaign 'Save our Sculpture' (SoS) was set up to encourage concerned members of the public to keep watch over their neighbourhood sculptures, and to report damage or negligence to the PMSA.

The Association is a charitable company which is run by its Executive Committee and Board of Director/Trustees. Sub-committees, when necessary, are established to organise events, projects or campaigns.

Company no 3415961
Registered Charity no 1064519.

PUBLIC SCULPTURE: WHAT COUNTS

What counts as public, or outdoor, sculptures and monuments in the PMSA? We count landscape or urban features that are sculptural and/or commemorative, or both. Not buildings, although we count commemorative clock towers, fountains, road markers (if they are substantially commemorative or sculptural). Because the prehistoric period is a different specialisation, we date the works roughly from the Stuart period. However, Oxford and Cambridge show medieval sculptures over college gateways, and a small number of medieval sculptures can be seen in London. The three remaining Eleanor Crosses, their bodywork and sculptures heavily restored, date from the thirteenth century. But earlier sculptures – Celtic, Anglo-Saxon or Roman – do not come into the PMSA's field.

We do not count church monuments, nor sculptures and monuments in cemeteries and churchyards unless they are publicly-subscribed, commemorative pieces that happen to have been sited there. We are conscious of the great importance of these latter examples but for the time being the PMSA is content for the specialists in these extensive subjects to support their own.

The PMSA recognises, also, the importance of war monuments as part of the tradition of public commemorative sculptures and monuments. We have a sister-relationship with the National Inventory of War Memorials and with the War Memorials Trust (see Links).

There are, and always will be, anomalies. Some of us, for example, feel that Epstein's superb St Michael and the Devil on the front of Coventry Cathedral has such an impact on the street scene that it should count in the PMSA as a public sculpture. Some would count the contents of sculpture parks and the landscaped surroundings of stately homes open to the public, such as Rousham (Oxfordshire) or Stowe in Bucks. Some sculptures on private estates such as Sandringham, where Adrian Jones's sculpture of Edward VII's favourite race horse Persimmon can be seen from the public highway, could be counted as public sculpture, since they too are in the public eye.

Note In the National Recording Project volumes, these criteria vary slightly from volume to volume.

THE PMSA: PROJECTS

The National Recording Project (NRP) answers questions about sculptures and monuments in your neighbourhood. A survey of public sculptures and monuments throughout Britain, it is 65% completed to 2002 and is still under way. This unique resource is a boon to scholars, conservators and custodians, as well as to the man in the street and the woman on the Clapham Omnibus (or any omnibus, bicycle, tricycle, jalopy or Shanks’s Pony).

Download the National Recording Project information sheet

The Sculpture Journal, published twice-yearly by Liverpool University Press. Launched in 1997, this is the foremost academic periodical on all aspects of sculpture (mainly in the Western tradition) from the post-medieval period to the present day. Please see our 'Publications' page for further details.

Save our Sculpture – an invitation to members of the public to report neighbourhood sculptures that have been damaged or vandalised, or that appear to be at risk. The PMSA will endeavour to contact local custodians and can support local campaigns to preserve a piece of public work at risk of damage, removal or alteration.

The Custodians Handbook 2005, an essential guide for families or individuals inheriting studio contents, collections or individual works of art. A collaborative venture with contributions from representatives of other cultural institutions including the Fine Art Society, Henry Moore Institute, Society of Portrait Sculptors, Tate Archive and Tate Conservation, University of Leeds.

'This handbook provides an invaluable resource for anyone inheriting a collection of art, particularly sculpture. It is essential reading for professional advisors: solicitors, accountants, trustees, curators, dealers and auctioneers ...'
(Timothy Llewellyn, formerly Director of The Henry Moore Foundation)

The Marsh Award for Public Sculpture

This annual award is sponsored by the Marsh Christian Trust and administered by the PMSA. The award is presented for excellence in contemporary work, and also for distinction in restoration of historical works. This encapsulates the PMSA's inclusive approach to public sculpture: as features in the urban and rural landscape, the association considers historical and contemporary sculptures to be equal in value.

Theft Alert! – the PMSA, War Memorials Trust and UK National Inventory of War Memorials are working with other leading institutions to alert members of the public to the escalating problem of art theft from public places. One objective is to compile an online database of stolen works, together with image and description. [See also Save our Sculpture above]

Other PMSA activities include a wide range of collaborative events; a support-group of historians, conservators and others who answer queries from the public; and the PMSA newsletter, 'Circumspice', circulated to members about four times a year.