Yorkshire doesn't need its own version of the Angel of the North – it is the North

The debate is underpinned by regret – or rather recrimination – that Yorkshire, through its commercial and cultural capital, Leeds, threw away the opportunity to commission an ambitious piece of public art by the then little known Antony Gormley more than a decade before he created the Angel. His proposed design for a Brick Man would have given Yorkshire a figure with a body similar to the Angel but almost twice its height – 120ft compared with 66ft.

Suggestions now put forward to enable Yorkshire to play catch up with Gormley’s Angel range from a white rose (too obvious surely?) and a Yorkshire pudding (missing ingredient gravitas) to an observation tower high enough to have incomers frothing at the mouth over the prospect of all the glories that await. Most original is the suggestion of a ‘Harvey Smith salute’, directed south. But perhaps best, though also hardest to realise, is the idea that since Yorkshire is ‘God’s Own County’ some image of God should brood over the Broad Acres. Get thee behind me, Angel.

But why should Yorkshire want an Angel equivalent anyway? You might anticipate that since I am a Yorkshireman I’m going to say that Yorkshire needs nothing but itself to proclaim its magnificence. Nothing of the sort. Isn’t Gormley’s Angel “of the North”? And isn’t Yorkshire part of the North? The county is content that its regional TV news programme is titled Look North. And Leeds leads in ‘The Northern Powerhouse.’

To Southerners the Angel’s broad wings probably do enfold the entire North, whatever the Southerners’ geographic concept of that might be. But Yorkshire’s quest for an ‘Angel’ shows that Gormley’s masterpiece is really mis-named. Essentially it is the Angel of the North-East. Or is it? Some years ago Durham decided it wanted its own ‘Angel’ even though the Angel stands in historic Durham – the real Durham. But Durham County Council insisted on erecting its own icon, an illuminated tower, in a field in the middle of nowhere near Sedgefield. Marking nothing more than a local government boundary, for which a simple sign is adequate, this was never needed.

Durham’s belief that it required something to rival the Angel has always been nonsense. For there’s no doubt the Angel has captured the public’s imagination far beyond its North-East home. But how much of that success is due to the name? Would the Angel be as widely known if it had been called the Angel of the North-East? What about The Angel of Tyneside? Or The Gateshead Angel? After all, Gateshead could have had the Angel for itself. But under that moniker it’s hard to see it being lauded as the most successful piece of public art since the war. It might not even have caused more than a ripple down in Yorkshire.

OBLIQUE footnote to the above. Stemming from Yorkshire’s huge success with major bicycle races, a bike is another proposed Yorkshire icon. Meanwhile Yarm hopes to host the Tour de Yorkshire. A spokesman for its parent Stockton council says this would “nicely complement” its own Cycling Festival!