It is like the first paragraph of a bit of old-fashioned science fiction: 'Overnight, figures, the size and shape of men, mysteriously appeared on high points of city buildings. All could be seen from the grey windowless bunker that crouched by the river. Some were near, others far off. All looked towards it.' That is indeed what has happened. One of Antony Gormley's armies has settled on us. If it really was science fiction they would have marched with rusty squeals from Cuxhaven, or from Crosby Beach by the Mersey where their brothers stand, washed by the tides, staring out to sea. As it is, they dot that part of the London horizon you can scan from the Hayward Gallery sculpture terraces.

LRB 21 June 2007 | PDF Download