An artist who has designed some of Blackpool’s world famous illuminations has joined the battle to save Shrewsbury’s Wakeman School from closure – by lighting up town buildings with a special protest message.
Andy McKeown, 58, from Belle Vue, is well-known for having his artwork beamed onto landmark buildings, and in 2007 he won a public competition to design a new feature for the Blackpool Illuminations, which is still shown today.
But now his work will be on display for a more poignant cause. The Wakeman, in Abbey Foregate, is set to close in July 2013.
The former school governor, whose two sons attended the school, told the Chronicle it was a ‘fabulous place’ for youngsters and especially for artists, with what he described as ‘probably the bestmusic recording studio in the county’.
And a date has been pencilled in for March 17 for Andy, armed with a makeshift buggy containing a battery-powered projector and computer, to ‘light up’ Shrewsbury buildings with the message WWW.WhyWasteWakeman?
He said: “The Wakeman has benefited people like my son Fergus and his band The Parallax because he did his first proper recording at the school.
“There’s a lot of support from people who have been to the school and it just seems so pointless to close it.
“I’m trying to help out and so I am going to project their protest logo around the town on the outside of buildings so people can see it.” He added that the protest logo will contain an animation piece of head girl Gemma Exelby and head boy Mathew Davies holding a placard which people will be able to add their names to in a ‘live’ petition by typing their names into the computer as the image is screened.
Meanwhile, headteacher Karen Moore said there would be a meeting of the Why Waste Wakeman? steering group today, Thursday, to discuss their approach to the six-week consultation period on the closure which was officially launched by Shropshire Council on Monday.
She said it was likely that Andy’s artwork would be beamed onto the Wakeman building on March 17 at about 7pm following parents’ evening.
Also fighting for survival include Stiperstones primary set to close in the summer of 2012, and St Mary’s primary which is facing a merger with Shawbury primary.
by Charlotte Hester