5West Highland Free Press | Friday 16 September 2011

daoine inntinneach � interesting people

We are looking for morepeople to profile. If there issomeone in your area youthink should be interviewed,please contact Lisa Falconeron 01471 820400 or e-maillisa.falconer@whfp.co.uk

A sculptor’s life of stone, otters and Skye

THE OTTER MAN OF SKYE:Laurence with one of hismany otter sculptures

LAURENCE BRODERICK neverintended to become a wildlifesculptor but is now known as the

“Otter Man of Skye”, with his sculpturesof the mammal to be found around theworld and his fascination with themlooking unlikely to end.

That his work is appreciated around theworld is readily understandable when heshows me maps, first of the UK and then ofthe world, with a pin marking everywhere oneof his sculptures is located. America, Canada,Australia, New Zealand… these are just someof the places where almost 2,500 sculpturesare distributed. “It’s incredible, really,”Laurence says. “Ingrid bought the maps forme one Christmas. She said ‘one day youwon’t know where they all are otherwise’.Thankfully she puts the pins in!”

After training for five years at the RegentStreet Polytechnic and the HammersmithSchool of Art in London, Laurence illustratedchildren’s books, painted and sculpted, beforeaccepting a teaching post at theHaberdashers’ Aske’s School in Elstree. Hewould remain there until 1981, havingbecome the school’s director of art in 1965.“We were the only school in the country thattaught stone carving and I was the only onewho could examine it! I enjoyed it but deepdown inside me I didn’t think I should be ateacher but should be working for myself.After 21 years I gave in my notice.”

A direct sculptor – meaning he carvesstraight into the stone with no drawings orguides – Laurence was invited to take part inthe first living craft exhibition in Britain inthe early 1970s, carving stone in public overfour days — an event which he would takepart in for several years.

“In 1978 I was approached by a man calledRichard Fowler who said he and his wife hadbeen impressed by my work the previousyear. He had just bought two islands off thecoast of Skye and he would like me to go upand carve using the stone from these islandsfor the rest of my life. There was a house onthe shore at Isle Ornsay we could use calledTides Reach and we ended up renting it forsix years.”

Laurence and his wife Ingrid and threeyoung sons, Graham, Robert and Oliver,came to Skye in a VW campervan during thesummer holidays that year, and began an

association with the island which continues tothis day.

“This was my introduction to the work ofGavin Maxwell. I started reading his books,then I looked at Phillip Wayre who kept ottersin Suffolk and realised I had never seen anotter. Well, I thought, I am never ever goingto make an animal. I didn’t want to go intothat area, I was a sculptor of shapes, modern,abstract shapes, I did not want to go down theroad of being a wildlife sculptor. But then Ithought if I am going to make an animalsculpture I’ll only do one, the otter, becauseit’s so agile and makes the most perculiarshapes. I was looking at Maxwell’s drawingsand thought yes, so I made a very compactform of an otter — maybe 18 inches long, inCornish soap stone — which you could movethis way and that.”

Laurence took the sculpture to Skye withhim on his next trip up and a chanceencounter while working on it would lead tothe creation of An Talla Dearg gallery at IsleOrnsay. “A man came up to me, who I knewowned the hotel, and said ‘I like your otterthere, what are you going to do with it?’. Isaid finish it off and exhibit it and he asked ifit was for sale. I said yes and told him itwould be £200, which was a lot of moneythen. He agreed, so we stayed on Skye foranother week! The man was Iain Noble,before he was a Sir.

“Later I asked Iain if could hold anexhibition in his old barn, An Talla Dearg, intwo years’ time and he said yes. He told meto do the publicity and he would pay foreverything else. So we had our first show in1980. I wanted to be the first sculptor onSkye to control the natural stone and also tohighlight otters as they were beingmistreated around the country — shot byfishermen, that type of thing. I wantedpeople to come and see the otter and howbeautiful it is.

“The response was just incredible, I earneda year’s salary in six weeks and took ordersfor more otters. People even bought stones —they were prepared to pay £3,000 for a stonebefore I carved it!”

After this Laurence decided to quit histeaching job, a decision which provoked thehead teacher to call him “a bloody fool”.

“But that gallery made me, I thought Iwould stop exhibiting after 25 years when Iwas on top. But then I came back for a show

during the Highland Year of Culture in 2007and I sold 40 sculptures in two weeks – itknocked me sideways.”

His love of otters also led to another role,as joint president of the International OtterSurvival Fund which was founded by Pauland Grace Yoxon from Broadford in 1993 —a role he continues to fill to this day.

“At one time in the 1980s there were only100 otters left in England. I thought, well I’llcreate a specific otter sculpture and donate aportion of the sale of it to the fund which Istill do today. I created an edition of 100, andwe have now got up to about 50 sold and Igive £340 to the IOSF for every one.

“Now I make otters and otters and otters, Ihave made well over 300 or 400, and they areall over the world.”

LAURENCE was born in 1935 andbrought up at Portishead near Bristol byhis grandparents after his parents, Jack

and Cynthia, divorced when he was two.Cynthia joined the Wrens and would see herson when she was on leave, while his fathervisited once a week.

“It was an incredible time really,” herecalls. “My father was a very clever engineerwho later worked on the first Concordeengine and he used to make me little toys liketanks, which had an engine and tracks. I usedto play on the beach, which was covered instones and mud, and we would see the shipscoming up the Bristol Channel and seeGerman planes bombing Avonmouth inBristol. The biggest daylight bombing raid inthe UK was in Bristol and I was in the dentistat the time! I actually saw the planes from thecellar.”

An artistic flair was evident from a youngage: “I could draw naturally, and was drawingperspective at the age of four.” An early loveof tennis was also fostered at school, and in1991 another fluke meeting led to Laurence’sinvolvement with the International TennisFederation.

“I love tennis and one day I was in thegallery and a couple came in saying theywere lost but ended up buying an ottersculpture. About six months later he phonedand asked me to make a head of PhillipeChatrier, the president of the InternationalTennis Federation! They asked me to take sixexamples down to Wimbledon to show him.We had an exhibition of the heads in the car

park which was just hilarious, and theycommissioned three of the heads.”

Seven years later Laurence was asked bythe new president, Brian Tobin, to design aGrand Slam trophy. The federation liked allthree of his designs so created another twoawards, including the Philippe ChatrierAward — the federation’s highest accolode.Among the players who have been presentedwith one of Laurence’s awards are RogerFederer, Serena Williams, MartinaNavratilova and Rafael Nadal.

“I used to think I would be known for myMother and Child sculpture of a nudebreastfeeding woman, which was bought byBells Whisky in Perth — the gardener used totake people around and try to avoid it as itembarrased him. Then the otter sculpturestook off, and unknown to me they nicknamedme the Otter Man of Skye! Sculpture is likethat, though, it keeps taking you from oneidea to the next, like all art. Then the tennisthing and then out of the blue the commissionto create the Birmingham Bull, which is nowthe third most photographed image in Britainapparently.”

The Birmingham Bull is indeed one ofLaurence’s best-known works, a six-tonnetwice life-size bronze sculpture of aHereford Bull which is situated inBirmingham’s Bullring commercial area.“We thought last year we would take theentire family to see it and get a photo of usall with it. We couldn’t get near! There werepeople taking photos, jumping on its back,sitting on its head. But I like that, I wantpeople to touch my sculptures. In my earlyshows I would put signs up saying so, I wantpeople to relate to the work and not feelinhibited.”

Laurence has extended his portfolio ofanimal sculptures to include various creaturesincluding badgers, turtles and polar bears andis still very much in demand as a sculptor. Hiswork has been selected as part of theScotland’s Islands Festival Exhibition whichopens in London at the end of the month, andcontinues to be exhibited in galleries aroundthe world.

Splitting his time between Skye andCambridge, Laurence’s other interests includea recently-purchased 1924 Bullnose Morrisand going out in his boat in Camuscross. Asfor sculpture, he says: “I just couldn’t stop,ever.”

A chance meeting inthe 1970s broughtLaurence Broderickto Skye, as LISAFALCONER foundout…

LISA FALCONERprofile

lisa.falconer@whfp.co.uk