A mural which has been located at Monument Tyne and Wear Metro station is celebrating 30 years in its current location. \u2018Famous Faces\u2019 \u00a0was painted by former coal miner and artist Bob Olley and was commissioned through the Metro\u2019s Art on Transport programme.<\/p>\n
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It shows 14 local personalities of the time looking out from a Metro carriage. Featured are Paul Gascoigne, Jimmy Nail, Sting, Cardinal Basil Hume, Mike Neville, Robson Green, Brian Johnson, Brendan Foster, Rowan Atkinson, Sir John Hall, Peter Beardsley, Dame Catherine Cookson, Tim Healy and Jack Charlton.<\/p>\n
Lynne Dickinson, Station Delivery Manager at Nexus, said: \u201cFamous Faces is one of the most popular works on the Metro system, and has been for the last three decades. The artwork depicts some of most famous celebrities from the north east of England and was originally part of Bob Olley\u2019s residency at the Customs House gallery in South Shields.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe felt that it needed a wider and more permanent audience and so we acquired it for our Art on Transport Programme at Monument. It sits on one of the busiest staircases on the Metro system and is seen by thousands of people each and every day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Back in 2021 (to celebrate its 25th<\/sup> anniversary), Nexus commissioned a film on the artwork. In that film artist Bob Olley said: \u201cI remember that I needed someone to open my exhibition at the Customs House and I asked the then director general of Nexus Mike Parker if he would help me out.<\/p>\n \u201cI knew Mike quite well and thought if he\u2019s opening the exhibition at the Customs House for me then I\u2019d do a painting for Nexus in return. I decided this idea of a railway carriage called famous faces, <\/em>which would be a Metro carriage with all these local celebrities on board. People like Sting, Jimmy Nail and the late Mike Neville.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen the exhibition was over with I was pleased to learn that the mural was going on permanent display at Monument Metro station \u2013 and it\u2019s still there to this day. I would love to know how many people have seen it. It\u2019s got to be in the millions.<\/p>\n \u201cMy family use Monument Metro station quite a lot and they always say that there\u2019s always somebody looking at the mural and trying to identify who all the people are in the carriage. The family like fact that people say \u2018oh, it was you\u2019re dad who painted that one\u2019. It\u2019s nice to have something there that as your legacy.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A mural which has been located at Monument Tyne and Wear Metro station is celebrating 30 years in its current location. \u2018Famous Faces\u2019 \u00a0was painted by former coal miner and artist Bob Olley and was commissioned through the Metro\u2019s Art … Continue reading