Meet the artist who has created Leicestershire's very own 'Terracotta Army' of 170,000 figures
An artist has recreated 170,000 Leicestershire people in clay form to mark the peak of the world human population. Julian Crosswell's creation is inspired by China's Terracotta and has filled his back garden full of clay figurines.
The handmade clay figures representing the population of the west of Leicestershire. The 170,000 population are dotted on a map which includes motorways in blue tarpaulin, animals from Twycross Zoo and a space rocket with "Richard 3" written up the side to celebrate the city's National Space Centre and Leicester's famous royal discovery.
Around the map, stacked in boxes, crates and bowls, are the small clay figures, representing the people living places including Leicester, Hinckley, Coalville, Market Bosworth and many of the villages between.
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Julian, who works as an artist making things including sculptures and tables, told LeicestershireLive: "It was a challenge doing it in the winter and a couple of hundred people got obliterated where the water got through! I'd like to have been able to do more detail, like the buildings in Leicester."
The project was an idea the 47-year-old came up with many years earlier. He started the planning and the creation of the clay figures about three years ago before setting it up in his garden from early December with help from family members including his wife, May.
The Leicestershire project, sponsored by Design Furniture Outlet in Stapleton, was not his first. Last year he and May created the Isle of Wight on farmland owned by May's family in her home country of Thailand.
He said that the extra space made things easier on that project - which includded 142,000 figures to represent the island's population. But there were drawbacks including the summer heat, thunderstorms, a hornet infestation and the local tarantulas, scorpions and venomous snakes. Julian was even stung by a scorpion during one low point of the project.
But he hasn't been deterred and hopes one day his project, called Youtar Army, will see the whole world population recreated in clay. The idea is to mark the world's population - a number what many believe to be is approaching its peak.
Julian said: "The aim is to eventually recreate everyone on Earth. I can't do that myself - I'd get repetitive strain injury long before I got there! The world population might peak in 20 years - or maybe more like 50 years - from now and it's a unique project in history documenting the reaching of that peak."
With part of Leicestershire recreated, the artist next hopes to recreate New York City and create the map at a UK theme park or tourist attraction to help provide funding and a bit more space than he has in his back garden in Beeston, near Nottingham.