Art: Hungry Castle plan giant Lionel Ritchie head for Bestival 2013

Date
7 June 2013

There’s a lot of weird things that go on at festivals (friends and colleagues tell me, I don’t do tents/port-a-loos/large crowds) but if you’re heading to Bestival this summer you might be in line for a surreal experience par excellence. Art collective Hungry Castle plan to build a three metre high inflatable Lionel Ritchie Head, potentially rising to six metres if they can raise the necessary funds through Kickstarter.

Visitors will be able to enter Lionel’s brain where they’ll find a ringing telephone and I shouldn’t have to tell you which of Lionel’s classics they’ll hear through the receiver. Rewards for backers range from Lionel Ritchie T-shirts and beanie hats to an overnight stay in the head itself – best how-we-got-engaged story ever?

There’s an admirable perefctionism at play in the Hungry Castle scheme, as they say: “To get Lionel looking like he did 30 years ago in inflatable style is no cheap trick. Achieving a face shape is one thing but adding nose, lips, cheekbones, colors, textures etc. increases the production cost even more. We want Lionel Richie’s Head looking his best from all sides.”

And if you can’t make it to the Isle of Wight for the festival then it may not be your only chance to enter Lionel’s massive head. “A good thing about an inflatable Lionel Richie Head is that it packs and travels well,” they point out. “Once we succeed in bringing it to Bestival the dream is for Lionel Richie’s Head to pop up and say ‘Hello’ in countries all over the world.”

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Hungry Castle: Lionel Ritchie’s Head artist’s impression

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Hungry Castle: Lionel Ritchie’s Head plans

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Hungry Castle: Lionel Ritchie’s Head T-Shirt

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Hungry Castle: Lionel Ritchie’s Head Hat

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What spending a night in Lionel Ritchie’s Head might look like

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About the Author

Rob Alderson

Rob joined It’s Nice That as Online Editor in July 2011 before becoming Editor-in-Chief and working across all editorial projects including itsnicethat.com, Printed Pages, Here and Nicer Tuesdays. Rob left It’s Nice That in June 2015.

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