Cult thing of the month - Ian Curtis portrait commissioned by Granada TV.
This ghostly image of Joy Division singer Ian Curtis is a panel from a huge mural built in Castlefield, Manchester for the Wall of Fame TV series made by Granada TV in 1998. It shows Curtis performing 'Shadowplay' on Granada Reports 20 years earlier. It formed part of a larger piece that covered the gable end of a building behind the White Lion pub on Liverpool Road and its one of only two sections that remain.
It was painted by Wigan muralist Matt Aindow for the three-part series which also featured mini documentaries about famous and creative people associated with 'Granadaland' - including Lennon and McCartney, the Gallagher brothers, Les Dawson, Vivienne Westwood and LS Lowry.
The mural stood for more than five years and was produced in co-operation with the Castlefield Management Company. Cult Manchester's David Nolan talks to the people involved in the project, at the time one of the largest pieces of public art built in Manchester for decades.
Matt Aindow - muralist: When the Granada TV commission came in, I was in the middle of my final year show at art school. A gable-ended building in Castlefield - near the Roman Fort - was the kind of canvas scale you don’t usually get to work on when you’re a scoundrel student. I seem to recall that there was some doubt by the production team that it could be completed in the timeframe. I remember being very excited, a bit nervous and really up for the challenge.
Lucy Atkinson - production secretary: Making these kinds of shows felt like being part of a buccaneering pirate crew - getting a mural painted on a wall in Manchester just because you felt like it. Amazing. I didn't know you could just do things like that.
Matt: I pretended I had a big studio so I’d get the gig, and cleared out my in-law’s office/workshop. Boards and paint arrived and some long painting shifts followed. Failure was not an option. It was so big, no one - including me - had seen the whole piece before it went up on the wall.
While Matt was busy painting, the Granada TV team was dashing around the country filming interviews to accompany the footage of him at work. The series featured chats with everyone from Tony Wilson talking about Ian Curtis, to Timmy Mallett discussing how he gave a teenage Chris Evans his first job in radio.
Ricardo Barker - researcher: I was fortunate to interview Heather Small, John Lennon’s sister Julia Baird, Les Dawson’s widow Tracy Dawson, and a young Peter Kay for the series. My abiding memory is interviewing the late Frank Carson on Blackpool Pier – he was a close friend of Les Dawson. Every bit as warm and funny off screen as he was on screen.
Lucy: My main memory is of Les Dawson's small daughter offering to share her crisps with me as we looked at the completed mural featuring her splendid dad. I dined out on that story for years - as well as on the crisps. Wall of Fame was one of my first experiences of making a television programme; I didn’t have a clue what I was doing and that didn't really change over the ensuing years. I was very happy to be in the mix, though.
Ricardo: Access to Granada’s remarkable archive - particularly rare Beatles interviews and outtakes - was another extraordinary privilege. There was archive footage of John Lennon doing a Nazi salute from the top of a building to a huge crowd of fans. Ringo turned to him and elbowed him in the ribs.
Leo Kretscher - film editor. Wall of Fame - or as it was affectionally known, The Granada Wonderwall - was a fantastic programme, because I'm a bit of an artist myself and I was really impressed with Matt's work. Funnily enough, Matt used to come into the edit suite and watch me editing sequences for the programme and he actually went on to become an editor himself. Just the fact that he was in the edit suite, watching what I was doing, changed his career path.
Matt: It was part of the cityscape for a long time - longer than intended - until they pulled down the building to make flats. Only two parts still exist - Ian Curtis and Heather Small - after we pulled them from the builder’s bonfire. My rescued board of the Gallagher brothers went to Bolton tip in the late 00’s.
Leo: I was really surprised one day when Ricardo came into my edit suite with a panel from the mural which they'd been pulling down. I thought it’d been lost forever. It's a good conversation piece. When people come round they always ask who it is and I say… Heather Small from M People and it's from the Wall of Fame TV show. So, I've got good memories from that time. Another thing is, I became friends with Matt and we still stay in touch, even to this day.
Matt: I’ve just got hold of a digital copy of all three programmes. Was it really nearly 30 years ago? I can’t bring myself to watch it through. I’ve seen a few moments and don’t recognise my own voice. But I think it’s good telly. Being on TV was a cringe, weird experience and I look frightened and fake. Just very self-conscious. I’d be better at it now that I ‘know where my towel is’. (Douglas Adams reference - CM). I’m proud of the mural, but if I could have a word with younger Matt, I’d say it’s the people you meet that make the work interesting and worthwhile, not the pieces we leave behind us.
Have you got a cult thing we could feature? The stranger the better. Get in touch with us at thisiscultmanchester@gmail.com. In the meantime, here's a clip showing the final unveiling of the Wall of Fame.
