Anti-tobacco gatecrasher uses art event as soapbox

When Antony Gormley first announced his plans to enlist members of the public to stand on top of Trafalgar Square's empty fourth plinth and do exactly as they wished for an hour, he anticipated "a certain degree of anarchy".

Ten minutes before the first participant was due to step up, he got just that, but perhaps not quite as he had wished - housewife Rachel Wardell was poetically pipped to the post by an interloper determined to storm this organised chaos for his own purposes.

As Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, Gormley and scores of spectators waited for the clock to strike nine, a spidery figure was seen scaling the heights with a banner tucked under his arm. Minutes later, he had made it to the top of the plinth and unfurled his anti-smoking banner which read: "Save the Children. Ban Tobacco and Actors Smoking."

Stuart Holmes, a seasoned protester who usually stands on a soapbox outside the High Court in London, had become the first member of the public - unofficially - to use the plinth as his very own giant soapbox.

By the time Wardell was due for her "first turn", many were more interested in him than in her. Johnson commended the man for his 15 minutes of fame.

"I want to thank the organisers and thank this man for ascending the plinth as brilliantly as he has. What is fame? Is it a lottery or is it self-selected as this chap's demonstration? This is one of the questions the fourth plinth asks us to meditate on."

Holmes, who was cautioned by community police afterwards, said he had come to Trafalgar Square after hearing about the event on the radio, and had decided to scale the plinth on an impulse.

"I decided 20 minutes before that I'd do it. I was slightly anxious because I thought I wouldn't be fit enough. It wasn't that difficult. I think my message is an important one," he said.

When asked what he thought about becoming a participant in a public artwork, he added: "It kills two birds with one stone."

Gormley gently prompted him to get off the plinth after the clock struck 9am and Rachel Wardell clambered on with a giant lollipop in her hand with an advert for a children's charity.

Later more participants climbed on: Jason Clark, a nurse from Brighton, stood and filmed himself and the crowd; Suren Senviratne, a graduate from Goldsmiths, dressed in a panda costume and displayed his mobile number so the public could ringhim.

Gormley said the participants would provide a "living picture" of Britain, adding that Holmes had been a "great warm-up act if the whole thing is about freedom of speech".

- INDEPENDENT