Under threat: Rainbow Slides Mural, Stirling

This amazing sculptural panel from 1973 is under threat from the imminent demolition of the Rainbow Slides Leisure Centre in Stirling, Scotland.

The Twentieth Century Society is campaigning to save this piece of public art that we believe should be either incorporated into the new development on the site when the leisure centre is demolished, or relocated elsewhere in Stirling. We have raised our concerns with Stirling Council and submitted a listing application for the panel to Historic Scotland.

The giant panel on the outside wall of the leisure centre is a rare example of an in-situ concrete artwork of the early 1970s. It depicts larger than life size abstract figures of swimmers and divers.

The sculptor Charles Anderson has highlighted its importance as “one of the very few figurative examples of its era left in Scotland created in in-situ concrete”.

The artist, Charles  Andersen, is an important muralist. A graduate of Glasgow School of Art he has carried out many mural commissions for local authorities and large companies.

Many of his works have been destroyed, the only examples of his mural work still existing are in Burnley (saved and re-sited last year at the Crowood Leisure Complex); Brandon Parade,  Motherwell; Strathclyde School of Architecture Building (listed at category B) and also at the Savoy Centre, Glasgow, although some of these are now believed to have been covered over.

Clare Price