Architect Zac Monro has unveiled plans to recreate David Bowie鈥檚 iconic lightning flash from the 1973 Aladdin Sane album as a three-storey high sculpture a stone鈥檚 throw from the legendary musician鈥檚 birthplace in Brixton, south London.
Standing across the road from Electric Avenue on Brixton High Street the 9 metre-high painted steel bolt would greet commuters exiting Brixton tube station.
A crowdfunding page seeks to raise 拢1 million to realise the project, which it says would be a 鈥渢hree-storey tall bolt from above. A 9-metre missive from another dimension, hurled from afar鈥�.
The campaign, which has the backing of Lambeth Council, has raised just over 拢44,000 since it launched last week.
Architect Monro said the design - based on makeup worn by Bowie on the album cover - needed to 鈥渂e as abstract as possible鈥� and would represent a bolt 鈥渨hich has been thrown down and landed in Brixton鈥�.
鈥淚t has an otherness to it, it鈥檚 not a statue that people can cry over, it鈥檚 a symbol of an idea, it can be different and show that people can be non-sequential and non-logical,鈥� he said.
Monro, whose eponymous practice is based in Effra Road, Brixton, added that the memorial aimed to provide a permanent tribute to the musican, rather than something transient.
鈥淲e鈥檝e worked for 25 years in that part of Brixton and have tried to get that area cleaned up,鈥� he said.
鈥淲hen you come out and look over the road from the station there鈥檚 occasionally a Christmas tree or something like a market but it is the perfect spot to draw all the people who are moving from the tube to the other side of the road and create a new place.鈥�
In the immediate aftermath of Bowie鈥檚 death in January 2016 thousands of Londoners congregated outside the nearby Ritzy Cinema in Brixton and spent the night together paying homage to the musician.
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