Global arts producer, Wild in Art, has announced that it will return to Birmingham in summer 2025, to deliver a brand new art trail, based on the city’s iconic bronze bull, in partnership with Birmingham Hospice.

The new sculpture trail is the first to be based on Laurence Broderick’s The Guardian, the city’s famous bronze bull which has been standing, turning in motion, outside The Bull Ring, since it opened in 2003 and has become synonymous with the city, symbolising the strength, persistence and determination of its people.

The trail continues Wild in Art’s mission to bring art out of the gallery and the individually decorated sculptures will create a journey of discovery around the city that is free, family friendly, and open to all. At the end of the trail, the large sculptures will be auctioned to raise money for Birmingham Hospice.

Birmingham Hospice is the primary provider of adult palliative and end of life care in the city and its surrounding areas. The charity provides exceptional care for patients and their families wherever and whenever it is needed; whether that’s in patients’ own homes, in the community, or its Selly Park and Erdington sites.

It costs around £16 million to run Birmingham Hospice each year, 40% of which must be covered through fundraising activity. Income raised through the Wild in Art Trail will ensure that even more local people get the vital care and support they need at the end of life.

This will be Wild In Art’s seventh visit to Birmingham; their previous trails have brought a menagerie of 514 animal sculptures including owls and owlets, bears big and small, a waddle of penguins, and even a family of Snowdogs to the city. Further Birmingham trails have included 175 BookBenches and also 51 human form sculptures, as part of Gratitude, Wild in Art’s first touring installation, which celebrated the contributions of NHS staff and all key workers during the pandemic.

Wild in Art’s sculpture trails deliver an impressive economic impact for the cities they visit across the world. Following The Big Sleuth trail in 2017, an independent evaluation by research consultants Newcastle Gateshead Initiative found an estimated 671,604 visitors actively engaged with the trail with many thousands more exposed to the sculptures over the 10 weeks of the trail. The event generated a direct economic impact of £9.8 million with a GVA of £4.7 million.

To date, Wild in Art has delivered over 130 public art trails, raising £26.3 million for charity partners across the world. The organisation has commissioned over 5.2k artists and worked with 4.9k sponsors, injecting £4.3m into local creative communities. In addition, the experienced organisation’s learning programmes have so far engaged with over 1.2 million young people.

For more information, visit: birminghamhospice.org.uk/wild-in-art