{"id":289838,"date":"2026-02-18T11:10:33","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T11:10:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/289838\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T11:10:33","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T11:10:33","slug":"jane-austen-martin-jennings-explains-artistic-choices-statue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/289838\/","title":{"rendered":"Jane Austen &#8211; Martin Jennings explains artistic choices statue"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n  The initial comment was posted on the Hampshire Chronicle Camera Club <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hampshirechronicle.co.uk\/yoursay\/facebook\/?ref=au\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Facebook<\/a> group on February 8, by frequent contributor Mark Ryan.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  He said, \u201cWe have no John Keats statue . . . But we have a haughty violation of Jane Austen\u2019s wit \u2013 because she happened to die here. Who votes for this?\u201d.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  The post received three likes.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  <img   width=\"100%\"\/>Unveiling of Jane Austen Sculpture at Winchester Cathedral. Sculptor Martin Jennings. (Image: Stuart Martin)\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  On February 15, Mr Ryan shared that the sculptor had gotten in touch to explain his artistic choices:\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  The sculptor said: \u201cI would say the face I modelled was more impassive than haughty, but you are entitled to your opinion. Her lightness and wit is expressed more in the figure as a whole, which is rising in a twisting motion as if about to dance.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  &#8220;I thought it was important to contradict the erroneous impression of Austen as a soft homely figure and to emphasise not only her very slight frame (historically accurate despite the implications of her sister&#8217;s sketch) but her authority in the field of social observation and of course in the writing of novels.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Mr Ryan wrote that Jennings\u2019 response was \u201cmuch appreciated\u201d.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Martin Jennings is one of Britain\u2019s leading figurative sculptors. He created the Charles Dickens statue in Portsmouth and the George Orwell statue in London, outside the BBC\u2019s headquarters.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  His statue of Jane Austen in Winchester was unveiled on October 16 last year, to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the author\u2019s birth.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Jane Austen spent the final weeks of her life at No. 8 College Street, Winchester. She passed away on July 18 1817.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The initial comment was posted on the Hampshire Chronicle Camera Club Facebook group on February 8, by frequent&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[442,498,499,500,501,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-289838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}