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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Graeme Virtue, Hollie Richardson, Hannah Verdier and Ellen E Jones

TV tonight: artist and fourth plinth model Alison Lapper tells her story

Closeup portrait of Alison Lapper.
A remarkable life story … Alison Lapper. Photograph: Harry Truman/BBC/Chalk Productions

In My Own Words: Alison Lapper

10.40pm, BBC One
Marc Quinn’s sculpture of pregnant artist Alison Lapper was a celebration of motherhood and disability, but it outraged many people when it was erected on the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square in 2005. She is still angry at the reaction, clips of which she rewatches in this frank documentary, before telling her remarkable and colourful life story. The main focus here, though, is on the beautiful relationship she had with her son, Parys, who died of an accidental drug overdose aged 19 after battling mental health issues. “All the doubting Thomases, they kind of won didn’t they?” she says, heartbreakingly, as she pours her grief into an exhibition of paintings about him. Hollie Richardson

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