ONE MAN ARMY

One Man Army is a travelling sculptural installation created by Colin Spofforth to explore Britain's lost industrial and social heritage. Each installation features up to fifteen casts of the same life-size figure, solemn, penitent, and rough-textured, arranged in locations that were once alive with workers, families, and activity: former power stations, dockyards, quarries, abandoned farms, and fading shopping centres. The figures appear to rise from the ground, repopulating forgotten spaces with silent witnesses to the past.

The project is filmed and shared across social media platforms including Instagram, YouTube and X, blending sculpture, place and people into short documentary-style films. With each site, One Man Army invites reflection on the power of art to reconnect us with our surroundings — and with each other. As Colin puts it, “Sculpture creates places.” This project takes that belief to the margins, to overlooked towns, rusting structures, and cultural voids, bringing public art back to the people it’s meant for.