I DO not wish to knock the talents of artists or the efforts of the people who approve and commission their work, but I would like their skills channelled into producing something the public would like to see rather than what they want the public to see.

My own thought on the works of public modern art are that they are the ultimate waste of space.

Blackburn seems to have more than most towns, what with metal trees, lumps of twisted iron and the gates now in Northgate.

I am still trying to work out what the sculpture is outside Blakey's bar. Is it of a banana? Or a banana gone bananas?

Or just simply a cock-eyed lamp-post, sited there to confuse anyone who may have had one too many?

Certainly, no dog could use this in the usual way without falling flat on its back.

Some wiser council in the future will no doubt have all these items removed and my suggestion would be to take them to the sewage works and have them erected in the grounds there.

T ANSBRO, Feniscliffe Drive, Blackburn.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.