Patrick Comerford
I was standing at the corner of Magdalene Street and Chesterton Road in Cambridge one afternoon recently, wating for the lights to change and the traffic to stop so that I could cross the street and visit Saint Giles Church. Had they changed with greater speed, I might not have noticed the ‘Cambridge Core’ or thoughtlessly mistaken it for another pole among the street lights, traffic lights and telephone poles.
But the ‘Cambridge Core’ is a modern sculpture by Michael Fairfax representing layers of Cambridge history dating back to Roman times. The 11.5 ft bronze column on this busy street corner is a totem pole-like sculpture that commemorates a treasure trove of 1,800 gold and silver mediaeval coins found by Anglian Water workers and now in the Fitzwilliam Museum.
The column opposite Saint Giles Church marks the end of a trail of bronze flowers embedded in pavements and forming rather a trail through the city. The trail begins with a few metal flowers at the corner of Saint John’s Street and Bridge Street, close to the chapel of Saint John’s College and the Round Church.
As you walk along the trail, 600 bronze and brassy flowers are embedded in the pavement, waiting to be seen or noticed by the unsuspecting pedestrian and visitor alike. The flowers have charming designs and they fit seamlessly into the streetscape. Yet they have a much deeper meaning that may be unfamiliar to some.
The trail leads up Bridge Street, passing Saint Clement’s Church and crossing the River Cam, continuing past Magdalene College and up to the corner of Magdalene Street and Chesterton Lane with the tall bronze column opposite Saint Giles Church.
The column is across the road from the Museum of Cambridge – previously known as the Cambridge Folk Museum – and a plaque in the wall on the street corner behind the sculpture explains its story.
Both the column and the flowers were designed by the artist Michael Fairfax. They are inspired by an archaeological dig at this site in the year 2000, when a hoard of mediaeval coins known as ‘the Magdalene Hoard’ was excavated. The trove of 1,800 gold and silver mediaeval coins is on display in the Fitzwilliam Museum.
The ‘Cambridge Core’ represents layers of Cambridge history and archaeology dating back to Roman times. The excavation also uncovered the remnants of a Roman street, first-millennium burial sites, Saxon and mediaeval buildings and a 19th century public house.
Michael Fairfax made his sculpture using oak tree chunks from Wimpole Hall, about 14 km south-west of Cambridge, carved and cast in bronze. He is a sculptor, environmental artist and sound artist who lives in deepest rural Somerset, where he is surrounded by trees, woods, valleys, rivers, owls and ravens – a location that he says is ‘the driving motivation that touches my creativity, an essence of sensitivity to the violence and beauty of nature and my surrounding’.
Michael Fairfax was born in Windsor, Berkshire, in 1953, the son of the poet John Fairfax. He studied at Portsmouth College of Art and then at Gwent College of Higher Education. He then worked as an artist, sculptor and public arts sound sculptor, with commissions throughout the UK and abroad and residencies in many countries.
His main practice has been public art in cities, towns, villages and sculpture trails. He also works with sound, creating instruments from live trees and roots, making instruments to play with sounds that are amplified and distorted.
Recently Michael Fairfax has been creating living sculptures, manipulating and grafting live trees around his surroundings exploring the nature in art, and he has also been working in bronze.
The wooden model made by Michael Fairfax for the ‘Cambridge Core’ is on display in the Museum of Cambridge. The public art project, which also includes street-side bollards, was sponsored by Cambridge City Council and Cambridgeshire County Council.
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