Statue of Robert Falcon Scott, Marble memorial statue in central Christchurch, New Zealand.
The Statue of Robert Falcon Scott is a white marble memorial in central Christchurch, located at the intersection of Worcester Street and Oxford Terrace. It depicts the Antarctic explorer holding a bronze pole and stands approximately 2.6 meters tall.
News of Scott's death reached Christchurch in February 1913, and within a week Mayor Henry Holland called a public meeting that formed the Scott Memorial Fund, raising over £1,000. In December 1914 the committee chose a statue and asked Kathleen Scott to replicate her bronze on Waterloo Place. Wartime metal prices led her to carve it in marble at Carrara in March 1916; it was unveiled on 9 February 1917.
The statue is a marble replica of Kathleen Scott's bronze in London, made because wartime bronze prices had risen. The plinth's plaque carries only Scott's name; the names of Wilson, Bowers, Oates and Evans were added in 1923, with a quote from Scott's final message. The figure wears polar travelling clothes and holds a bronze alpenstock.
The statue sits at a busy intersection in the city center and is easy to locate and visit. After the 2011 earthquake damaged it, the memorial was fully restored with reinforcements to protect it from future movement.
Kathleen Scott carved the statue in Carrara from a block of more than 12 cubic metres, calling it "a wonderfully fine piece of marble". She left the gloves and the area around one leg unfinished, intending to complete them if she ever reached Christchurch; she never did.
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