Tim Tolkien

• Name — Tim Tolkien • Born — 1962 10 • Field — Sculpture • Works — Sentinel

Tim is the great-nephew of the writer J. R. R. Tolkien. He was raised in the village of Hughenden Valley and went to the Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe. He graduated with a degree in fine art (sculpture) from the University of Reading in 1984.

Sentinel is Tolkien's most famous work to date. In 1996, he was appointed by CAN who were awarded the contract to develop public art proposals for the estate using National Lottery money, as an artist in residence to help with regeneration of the Castle Vale estate in Birmingham. The following year, he consulted with residents about an art project for the entrance to the estate. They favoured a sculpture featuring Spitfires, reflecting the area's flying history and particularly the Castle Bromwich Assembly which stood nearby. The large steel and aluminium Sentinel Spitfire sculpture was the result, showing three Spitfires peeling off up into the air in different directions. It was unveiled on 14 November 2000, near the former factory which built them, by their former test pilot Alex Henshaw.

Tolkien also sculpted a memorial to the actor Sir Cedric Hardwicke, at the latter's birthplace of Lye, West Midlands, for Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council. The memorial takes the form of a giant filmstrip, the illuminated cut metal panels illustrating scenes from some of Sir Cedric's best-known roles, which include The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Shape of Things to Come, and The Ghost of Frankenstein. It was unveiled in November 2005.

His proposals for a 20-foot (6.1 meter) high statue of Treebeard, an Ent from The Lord of the Rings, to be erected on the Green at Moseley, near J. R. R. Tolkien's childhood home in Birmingham, have met with some controversy, but permission for its erection – originally scheduled for May 2007 – was granted by Birmingham City Council.

• Work — * Location * (Birmingham unless stated) — Date — Picture — * Coordinates * (With links to map and aerial photo sources) — Notes • James Watt's Mad Machine — Winson Green Metro station — 1998 — — Supported by Eric Klein Velderman, Paula Woof and local school pupils. • Lanchester Car Monument — Nechells — 1995 — — On the site of the development of the first British petrol-engined car • Mosaics — Menzies High School, Sandwell — With Eric Klein Velderman and pupils. • Millennium Sculpture — St.Nicholas School, Kenilworth — 2001 — With pupils • Dragonfly sculpture — Hembrook Infants and Junior school, Warwickshire — 2003 05 — With Emma Dicks • Gateway — Belle Vue Primary School, Stourbridge • Archway — Springhallow School, Ealing — With pupils. • Memorial to Sir Cedric Hardwicke — Lye, West Midlands — 2005 11 — • Bluebell — Sot's Hole Local Nature Reserve, West Bromwich — 2008 — • Gate — Sot's Hole Local Nature Reserve, West Bromwich — 2008 — • Gates — RSPB Sandwell Valley — • Sentinel — Castle Bromwich — 2000 11 14 — • Cardinal Newman statue — Birmingham Newman University — 2010 — — Was at Cofton Park on 19 September 2010 for Pope Benedict XVI to beatify Cardinal Newman. Now located at Birmingham Newman University in the Ryland Quad of the campus. • Gate — Holly Wood Local Nature Reserve, Sandwell — 2012 — • Roots and Branches — Handsworth Park — 2020 — — With Graham Jones. Four trees with extended roots on the ground in steel which can be used as seats. • Here and Now Bench — Handsworth Park — 2023 8 — Was inspired by a fairground waltzer car. Was commissioned to mark Birmingham hosting the 2022 Commonwealth Games. Tolkien also undertook the redesign of Lea Hall railway station, Birmingham, with Eric Klein Velderman; completed in 1998)

He has also worked with the singer and television presenter Toyah Willcox, designing her armour-like stage costumes and, in 2005, making a documentary film for BBC2, comparing New Zealand's successful exploitation of its movie-related J. R. R. Tolkien associations, with that of J.R.R.'s (and Toyah's) home town, Birmingham.