Statues at Downing Street!
The statues of incredible women from put her forward have been to some fantastic places (Catriona, we’re looking at you and your mini-me scaling the tallest mountain on Lesbos) – and now we have a new destination to add to the list:
🇬🇧 11 DOWNING STREET 👩💼
Pictured: Sheila Scott about to enter 11 Downing Street to visit her statue
That’s right, Rachel Reeves – the UK’s first ever female Chancellor of the Exchequer- has curated an entire collection of artworks by women, or celebrating notable women, for the function rooms of 11 Downing Street. As a bonus, all the artworks focused on men were found new homes elsewhere. Naturally, when we found out, we knew we had some statues that might be of interest…
So this summer, non zero one headed to Downing Street with the put her forward statues of Sheila Scott and Ruth Ibegbuna, for display in the function room of Number 11. Sheila was even able to come along and visit herself – what a wild moment.
The women from put her forward continue to inspire us and we thank the Chancellor and her team for celebrating women and inviting us to share the statues with some of the World’s most powerful visitors.
Above: a magnificent meeting
Above: the put her forward statues either side of the maquette for Gillian Wearing’s statue of Millicent Fawcett, which stands full-size in Parliament Square
SHEILA SCOTT co-founded Shelter From The Storm, London’s free homeless shelter, available all year around. In the eleven years since Sheila started the shelter in Islington, they have helped thousands of people of all backgrounds and situations into housing. SFTS has found people employment, reunited mothers with their children, kept people out of gang crime and supported young people who have been kicked out of their family home for their sexuality. SFTS has helped homeless civil servants, office managers, baristas, care workers, midwives, Uber drivers and all sorts of other ordinary people back in to the housing they need and rightfully deserve.
RUTH IBEGBUNA is an activist and a fierce champion of young people’s right to be seen and heard. After a teaching career in Bradford and Manchester, Ruth founded the charity RECLAIM, supporting young people from working class communities to challenge leadership inequality. She then founded The Roots Programme, an initiative to bring people from vastly different communities together to learn from each other and increase societal levels of connection, curiosity and compassion. Ruth is also the founder of Rekindle School, supplementary education for young critical thinkers in London and Manchester. She was named by Virgin as one of the top six women change makers globally and is an Ashoka UK Fellow.