Ice sculpture festival will make Wharf even cooler

By Simon Hayes on January 13, 2010 4:23 PM |

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Canary Wharf will be an even cooler place to be this weekend when it hosts the London Ice Sculpting Festival.

The free event will take place next to the ice rink in Canada Square Park on Friday and Saturday, when five teams of international sculptors will work against the clock to carve 2x2m blocks of ice into works of art in front of the public.

Their work will reflect Canary Wharf's past and present roles as a commercial, trading and retail hub, and the sculptures will draw on the challenges of commerce and convey a sense of adventure, ships overcoming obstacles on their journeys, enterprising people riding the waves and carving out a niche for themselves in a quest for fun and fortune.

A UK team will compete against French, Dutch and Italian counterparts, using chainsaws, chipping tools and chisels.

The public can also test their artistic ice sculpting skills at one of the free supervised master classes.

The winning entry - judged by Guy Portelli, fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors, Sally Williams, Public Art Consultant at Canary Wharf Group, and Carol Cordrey from Art Alone - will be declared at 3.00pm on Saturday.

Lucie Moore, arts and events manager from Canary Wharf Group, said: "This is a world class event and we're pleased to bring it to Canary Wharf. It will add to the vibrancy of the area, which is already buzzing in the evenings and weekends over the winter.