Frank Dobson - London Pride

The London Pride is a bronze-cast sculpture created by Frank Dobson to celebrate the Festival of Britain in 1951 and commissioned for the Festival, which was chosen by the Festival Design Group with assistance from the Arts Council of Great Britain. The sculpture originally formed as part of a series of sculptures created by over 30 leading artists of that time.

It was given by Mary Dobson in 1987 and unveiled with a new slab as a permanent public installation on Thursday 10 September 1987 by Ronald Grierson, Chairman of the South Bank Board. It is now situated outside the National Theatre on the South Bank in London. The sculpture is listed as Grade II.

Running on a theme of leisure, Dobson adopted the use of plaster and finished with gun-metal, due to budgetary constraints required for bronze. With assistance from his students, he developed the full-scale clay models at the studio of the Royal Academy of Art. The sculpture was then placed outside the Royal Festival Hall’s Belvedere Road entrance.

Once the Festival came to an end, the work was placed into storage until 1986 when Dobson’s widow Mary decided to give the sculpture to the Arts Council to recast in bronze. The casting was done by Morris Singer Foundry and funded by Lynton Property & Revisionary Plc and The Henry Moore Foundation.

Cast in bronze from the original plaster, the work features two nude female figures with a bowl as they both sit on a raised plinth, which form as a reminder of the event that took place on the very site over 50 years ago. The work was to feature the plant Sacifraga Urbium, hence the name given to the sculpture. The inscription carved by David Kindersley reads:

LONDON PRIDE
FRANK DOBSON CBE RA
1886–1963
Commissioned for
THE FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN 1951
GIVEN BY MARY DOBSON 1987
AND PLACED ON THE SOUTH BANK
Assisted generously by Lynton Property & Revisionary Plc and The Henry Moore Foundation
ARTS COUNCIL OF GREAT BRITAIN