Cathy Ward frieze

“When I was first commissioned to do this piece I had very little time, 6 weeks I recall. I was the last artist brought in to create a work for a fairly large wall. On my own initiative I researched the buildings existing sculptures, to see what I could learn about the building and use this as a starting point bringing history from the outside in.

The sculpted surface of the frieze I created in 1992 had areas that remained quite hidden as I hadn’t had the opportunity to properly bring out the details because of the physicality of the material.

With the short time scale from making the piece flat on the ground, to also painting it on the ground, not upright as you would want, the plaster was so new, and yet to fully cure, hard but not fully hard. 

Now, decades on, the piece is dry to perfection, bone hard and once the sculpted surface ridges were slightly sanded, it is revealing a wealth of details I’d sculpted all those years ago, which I had previously intending to be more prominent but now was a much easier task to bring them out of the shadows.

This I started doing, sanding lightly, creating a sense of light beaming out of the shadows. This was like excavating, revealing a buried past.

As the middle figure of the working man was now lost from the original frieze, the meaning the piece had in relation to the workings of the ICAEW was also now irrevocably changed. It was now left decorative, its content less about man’s trades and endeavours which was at the heart of the original intact piece.

So I realised as I went on that some of that content had to be brought back in as best I could to give it relevance to the values of the Institution.

The second female figure (right hand side) I then developed into a symbolic, mythic figure representing Industry, finance, trades & communication. 
I Incorporated an industrialised built landscape growing from the heartland, the hemispheres of her breasts represent the sun rising in the East and setting in the West = The working man’s day.

In the left-hand corner above smoking factory chimneys are a fleet of ships bringing commerce and trade from across the seas, materials for tradesmen to hone their craft and create income

A part of the skyline here alongside the factories holds the ever growing, ever changing, city’s financial centres.

In the central cleavage dividing the 2 hemispheres is a pole which started off as a tree, the tree is a central material that has helped build empires, this tree trunk is stripped and it’s now a telegraph pole. Surrounding the pole is a rising spiral ribbon floating upwards, linking trees to communication commerce and also its ancestor - coal, and the coal industry. One reason I used Sumi ink was because it’s made from soot, it’s a meaningful cycle of how we have utilised the Earths produce. Also buildings being streaked black and white from the soot in cities, we once lived in a blackened cityscape which I actually quite loved.

This upright pole supports the measure and between its open callipers holds the dawning of the female figure, Economia. Her attire is purposely altered from the current representation logo of the ICAEW, as her fashion is more in keeping with the 19th century.

Either side of these centre symbols are the earthly untidy landscapes of mining, which drove, the very core of industry in the 19th century into 20th century etc

The spirals that emanate from the right hand side females head allude to systems of trading.. representing movement & communication which link up to the protective energy being shared by the lefthand ethereal winged figure. An energy line emanating from the left-hand figure bridging both females and creating unison.

A background sky of planets and stars represents the eternal universe which grounds the heavens and Earth

Around the winged figure to left hand side, her head is entangled with the slim branches of a flowering plant, adorning her eyelids and throat with fallen petals. These flourishing roots about her neck & chest symbolise regeneration and prosperity.

The women’s loose toga like garments have rolling undulations representing movement. The winged figure hovers above the heavy wheels of industry; the right-hand figure stands above a baroque bar code. The barcode lines can be seen throughout the piece linking it together.

Above the ‘barcode’ & in other areas around the frieze are deep centric fissures which represent mining of fossilised fuel & mineral extraction.

I have attempted to portray with this updated renovation an earthly world of mans’ labour and ingenuity, existing within unseen energies and fantastical systems of visions & beliefs."

Cathy Ward, April 2026