French metal festival Hellfest is honoring late Motörhead leader Lemmy Kilmister with a massive statue enshrined with a portion of ashes.
Motörhead played the first iteration of Hellfest and were a staple at the festival in the years prior to Lemmy’s passing. A massive statue of the legend will now look over the festival grounds, with a tribute ceremony following Scorpions’ set this Thursday (June 23rd).
Motörhead members Mikkey Dee (now a member of Scorpions) and Phil Campbell will be present at the ceremony, where they will raise a toast to the new statue and the memory of their longtime bandmate. Both Dee and Campbell are expected to speak before the viewing of a tribute video.
The new statue replaces a previous Lemmy monument that stood at Hellfest for the past six years. The latter statue was falling apart due to crumbling plaster, so the fest commissioned French sculptor Caroline Brisset for the new metal sculpture that can be seen in the above photos.
Brisset’s primary medium is steelwork, and she crafted a striking and very metal depiction of the Motörhead frontman. As the scale in the photo shows, the statue is huge, looming over those in its presence. The sheer size made it a difficult assignment for Brisset, who immediately agreed to undertake the task when approached by Hellfest organizers.
“I said yes because it was a great project,” she told Ouest-France [via Blabbermouth]. “And it was also quite a challenge to make such a big statue in such a short time.”
A replica of the custom urn at Lemmy’s memorial at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Hollywood, California, is enshrined within the statue, containing a portion of the late rock icon’s ashes.
See the full scale image of the new Lemmy statue below.