KnifeAngel – For Damon, and his mum

A message from V in Hastings on Thursday evening to alert me to the fact that this sculpture is currently standing in the grounds of Rochester cathedral, but only until Sunday, and would I please visit it in her place. Of course!
V is not sure she could brave it herself, and I don't blame her for that.

The sculpture comprises some 100,000 knives, many of which were handed in during a knife amnesty, others confiscated, and a handful are actual murder weapons.
Some have had their blades engraved with love to the victims from the families left bereft.

The knife that killed Damon is not part of this sculpture, it remains in custody as evidence in a murder trial long since concluded.
I asked V if she would feel differently about meeting this sculpture face-to-face if she knew that the knife that had taken Damon's life were an integral part of it. Emphatically yes! His blood. His DNA. Her DNA. Her blood. How could you not connect with that? But at what cost? At what pain? Impossible to imagine.

I spent a lot of Thursday evening looking at images of this on the internet, but even having done so, I was quite unprepared for the shocking reality. My first sight of it reminded me of my first sight of the pyramids at Giza. Yes we have all seen hundreds of images of those, but nothing prepares you for the scale of the feat, and of course your immediate reaction is to photograph them, despite the fact that you already know that a photograph will fail to communicate their scale. It is exactly so with this piece. Just standing at the door leading out from the cathedral into its pretty walled garden, this rusty monster dominates in its immensity. I was already in tears before I had stepped out through the doorway.

There may follow another day or two of this in different lights and weather conditions, at different times of the day. I may well start deleting extras. That remains to be seen.