SCULPTOR Graham Ibbeson is being coaxed out of his retirement before it’s even begun to create a sculpture only he could make a Barnsley tribute to Kes.
Graham said last year his memorial to the victims of the Oaks Colliery Disaster would be his last major work.
News of his retirement came as a blow to a new group set up to campaign and fund-raise for a statue in tribute to author Barry Hines who died last year. They said there was only one person who could make the statue.
But the Chronicle rang Graham this week to tell him the group had planned to invite him to make the statue. They want it to depict the young Billy Casper and his kestrel Kes, from Barry's most famous book A Kestrel for a Knave, which was turned into the cult classic 1969 film Kes.
“I suppose I’m a bit like Frank Sinatra. One more song won’t kill me, will it?” said Graham, 65, of Cockerham Lane, Barnsley.
“I would love to be involved with the project, and I have to say it’s the sort of thing I should be able to do justice to. It needs the love of Barnsley behind it. “
Read more in this weeks Barnsley Chronicle
