Maggi Hambling’s Wollstonecraft statue is hideous but fitting

Frankly, it is rather hideous — but also quite wonderful, shimmering against the weak blue of a late November sky. The new statue ‘for’ Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-97), the radical writer, journalist, teacher and novelist, had drawn quite a crowd to Newington Green in north London when I went to see it. They were gathered round it, puzzled and questioning, trying to work out what to think of the tiny figure on top, the garish silvery finish, the heaving bulbous mass below.

The memorial, designed by the sculptor Maggi Hambling, has been vilified since its unveiling a few weeks ago by critics who have focused on the nude female figure, bothered by the beautifully styled tits and perhaps perturbed by the very obvious bush of pubic hair. But the figure itself looks to be no more than a foot tall, and is striking not for its nudity but for its strong, upright, energetic posture and its extraordinary emergence from the organic mass below.