After decades of debate over how to honour the women who used to work in the city’s shirt factories, Derry has produced a sculpture of three giant spools of thread cast in bronze.
Ranging in height from 2 to 3.5 metres (6.5-11.5ft), the monuments loom over Harbour Square to recall an era when thousands of girls and women worked in dozens of factories that made the Northern Irish city a world leader in shirt production.
However, some former workers are aghast and say the decision to use abstract symbols rather than female figures occludes their role from history. “This gesture fell way short of what we hoped for – we feel airbrushed out of it,” Clare Moore told the BBC this week.
Before the official unveiling last month, several former workers staged a protest and held a banner saying “these factory girls say no”. There had been no proper consultation and the bronze spools did not accurately resemble the ones they used in the factories, they said.
Derry city and Strabane district council had hoped the £187,000 design would draw a line under a troubled 20-year stop-start quest to represent the city’s industrial heritage with public art. The council called the artwork a “fitting tribute” and said it had fully engaged with the former workers.
Quotes from former factory shirt workers resemble a thread from one of the spools. Photograph: Chris Wilson
Chris Wilson, the artist behind the sculpture, said at least two years of consultations included a day-long workshop that showed a model of the artwork to dozens of former workers, who at that meeting raised no objections.
“They all seemed onboard with the idea,” Wilson told the Guardian. “I’ve never worked on a project that had such an extensive and transparent process.”
The sculptures are not figurative but “almost anthropomorphic” in suggesting a group of people, with textures and shadows to evoke memory, he said. “The factories are all gone but what came across to me, in talks with the ladies, was their memories and recollections and friendships.”
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One of the bronze spools emits what appears to be a loose thread around the base but is in fact quotes from some former workers, Wilson said. “I’ve been told that public art is like sport. Everybody has opinion and is entitled to have an opinion.”
JD Twitch, one half of the celebrated Scottish DJ and production duo Optimo, has been diagnosed with a brain tumour which he has been told is untreatable.
The musician, real name Keith McIvor, announced the news in a post on Instagram. He said: “My symptoms weren’t immediately diagnosed, and my health declined very rapidly over just a few weeks. Because of how rapidly everything progressed I haven’t been able to share this news personally with everyone I care about so this feels the clearest and kindest way to let you know what’s happening.”
McIvor had cancelled several recent gigs as he underwent testing. He added: “I am currently trying to process this news and prioritising spending precious time with the people I love.”
Optimo, with McIvor alongside Jonnie Wilkes (AKA JG Wilkes), are icons of Scottish and indeed British dance music culture, with their punkish and passionate attitude to DJing resulting in sets of astonishing power. Hopping from techno to disco, industrial to soft rock, their sets cover huge stylistic ground, and their weekly Optimo Espacio residency at Glasgow’s Sub Club between 1997 and 2010 became a pilgrimage for global dance fans.
McIvor, left, with Jonnie Wilkes AKA JG Wilkes. Photograph: Ross Giilmore
The pair are musicians in their own right, creating ambitious remixes for artists including Florence + the Machine and Manic Street Preachers; McIvor also remixed the likes of Primal Scream, Hot Chip and Nightmares on Wax.
Optimo also created acclaimed DJ mix albums such as How to Kill the DJ (Part 2), Optimo Present Psyche Out and an entry in the mix series by London nightclub Fabric. They also founded a label, Optimo Music, which spawned various spinoff labels.
McIvor posted a link to a messageboard for fans to share messages of support.
Keith McIvor, aka JD Twitch, posted news of the diagnosis on social media.
One half of legendary Glasgow clubbing duo Optimo has revealed he has been diagnosed with an untreatable brain tumour.
Keith McIvor, aka JD Twitch, posted news of the diagnosis on social media.
Along with Jonnie Wilkes he ran Optimo Espacio – one of the city’s most loved club nights – for 13 years between 1997 and 2010 at the Sub Club venue.
McIvor said it had been an honour to make a living doing something he loved.
He wrote: “Following extensive tests I’ve been diagnosed with a brain tumour and I have been told my condition is untreatable.
“As you can imagine, I am currently trying to process this news and prioritising spending precious time with the people I love.”
The DJ added the diagnosis had progressed rapidly, and his health had worsened very quickly.
He said he truly appreciated “everyone’s love and concern, it means the world to me” and that he trusted Wilkes would continue making music under the Optimo name.
He wrote: “Jonnie and I have been lucky enough to play our music at countless clubs and festivals throughout the world and it has been one of the greatest honours of my life to make a career out of something I love.
“We have connected with so many beautiful souls through our shared passion for music.”
Wilkes to continue Optimo Espacio
McIvor was originally from Edinburgh but moved to Glasgow to attend university, which was when he began to DJ.
In Edinburgh he established famed night Pure in the 1990s, before setting up Optimo in 1997 with his friend Wilkes, who uses the name JD Wilkes when performing.
The night was known for its eclectic music and proved hugely popular, while the pair continued to tour and release music after the club night concluded.
Wilkes wrote on social media it was “painful to put into words” how he felt.
He said: “Keith and I have been through so much together in our 28-year partnership. We are connected in a way that perhaps only he and I can understand.
“I do know however, that if you ever heard us play together then you will have realised how deep that connection is.
“I love you Keith. You inspired me like nobody else could and I’m so proud of what we’ve done together.
“I will continue Optimo (Espacio) with you always in my heart. The music will speak for both of us. Your anarchic spirit and your ferocious energy is all around me.”
Sitaare Zameen Par Worldwide Box Office Day 13 (Photo Credit –Facebook)
Aamir Khan’s Sitaare Zameen Par has turned out to be a pleasant surprise at the worldwide box office. After the debacle of Laal Singh Chaddha, expectations were minimal from his latest comedy-drama. But it has exceeded all projections by comfortably entering the 200 crore club. Yesterday, on day 13, it surpassed Salman Khan’s Sikandar to become Bollywood’s 4th highest-grossing film globally and crossed five other Bollywood biggies. Keep reading for a detailed report!
How much did Sitaare Zameen Par earn at the worldwide box office in 13 days?
The comedy-drama displayed impressive growth over its second weekend. On the second Monday, there was an expected drop, but on Tuesday, it remained rock-steady, all thanks to discounted ticket rates. Yesterday, on the second Wednesday, there was a noticeable drop, but the overall collection is good. In India, it has earned 132.53 crore net so far. Adjusting for GST, it stands at 156.38 crore gross.
Overseas, the estimated collection stands at 56 crore gross. Combining this with the Indian gross, Sitaare Zameen Par’s 13-day worldwide box office collection stands at 212.38 crore gross.
Box office breakdown:
India net – 132.53 crores
India gross – 156.38 crores
Overseas gross – 56 crores
Worldwide gross – 212.38 crores
Sitaare Zameen Par becomes Bollywood’s 4th highest-grosser of 2025!
With 212.38 crores, Sitaare Zameen Par has now surpassed Sikandar (211.34 crores) to become Bollywood’s 4th highest-grossing film of 2025 globally. The next target is Raid 2 (242.56 crores).
Take a look at the top 5 Bollywood grossers of 2025 globally:
Chhaava – 827.06 crores
Housefull 5 – 302.5 crores
Raid 2 – 242.57 crores
Sitaare Zameen Par – 212.38 crores
Sikandar – 211.34 crores
Crosses Gangubai Kathiawadi and 4 other films
Also, other than Sikandar, the Aamir Khan starrer surpassed five Bollywood films on its 13th day. The list includes Gangubai Kathiawadi (208.17 crores), Chhichhore (208.42 crores), Kaabil (209.5 crores), Don 2 (210.8 crores), and Hichki (210.81 crores).
More about the film
Directed by R. S. Prasanna, Sitaare Zameen Par also stars Genelia D’Souza, Aroush Datta, Gopi Krishnan Varma, and others. It was produced by Aamir Khan Productions. The film was theatrically released on 20 June 2025.
Stay tuned to Koimoi for more box office updates!
Must Read: Hari Hara Veera Mallu Trailer Impact At Box Office Day 1: Pawan Kalyan Is In The Mood To Break His 3-Year-Old Opening Day Record!
The BBC has said it was wrong to believe the punk duo Bob Vylan were “suitable for live streaming with appropriate mitigations” for their performance at Glastonbury festival, despite ranking them as “high risk” before the event.
In a statement signalling there would be repercussions for those behind the failure, the corporation said: “We fully understand the strength of feeling regarding Bob Vylan’s live appearance at Glastonbury on the BBC.
“Bob Vylan were deemed high risk following a risk assessment process applied to all acts appearing at Glastonbury. Seven acts including Bob Vylan were included in this category and they were all deemed suitable for live streaming with appropriate mitigations.
“Prior to Glastonbury, a decision was taken that compliance risks could be mitigated in real time on the live stream – through the use of language or content warnings – without the need for a delay. This was clearly not the case.
“During the performance, the live stream was monitored in line with the agreed compliance protocols and a number of issues were escalated. Warnings appeared on the stream on two occasions and the editorial team took the decision not to cut the feed. This was an error.
“Given the failings that have been acknowledged we are taking actions to ensure proper accountability for those found to be responsible for those failings in the live broadcast. We will not comment further on those processes at this time.
“Furthermore, as a result we will make immediate changes to live streaming music events. “Any music performances deemed high risk will now not be broadcast live or streamed live.”
Bobby Vylan, whose real name is Pascal Robinson-Foster, led chants of “Death, death to the IDF”, referring to the Israel Defense Forces, at Glastonbury last Saturday.
The BBC initially placed a warning on screen for viewers, but later said it regretted not intervening by pulling the live stream. The BBC director general, Tim Davie, was at the festival in the hours after the set and ordered the content not to feature in any further BBC coverage, but technical issues meant it remained on the iPlayer for several hours.
Teatro del Mondo, Venice 1979. Image by Antonio Martinelli
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The first edition of the Venice Architecture Biennale took place in 1980, immediately revealing its role as a platform for images and ideas that would become essential references in contemporary architectural theory and practice. This disruptive character was embodied from the very beginning by the strangely familiar floating structure designed by Aldo Rossi, titled Teatro del Mondo. At once temporary and archetypal, the project introduced central themes that would shape Italian architectural discourse in the years that followed. To this day, it continues to inspire reflections on timelessness, imagination, and the memory embedded in cities.
Dom Brown’s love of music was started by an “ex-hippie” PE teacher at his school
As Duran Duran prepare to take the stage at Powderham Castle in Devon, lead guitarist Dom Brown is experiencing more than just pre-show excitement, he is coming home.
“I lived here from the age of four to 12,” Brown says, standing in Bull Meadow Park, Exeter, a place still vivid in his memory.
“This hill, we used to sledge down it when it snowed and I had a den in those bushes over there.
Now based in London, Brown’s return to Exeter has stirred a wave of nostalgia. “We’d sneak into a derelict building by the cemetery. It was just kids messing about, but those memories are strong.”
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Dom Brown, right, became Duran Duran’s guitarist after filling in for Andy Taylor in 2004
Earlier in the day, he visited his childhood home.
“I wasn’t expecting to go back inside,” he said. “But walking through that door, it hit me.
“The pine floorboards were exactly as I remembered, the layout hadn’t changed.
“My old bedroom still faced the garden, of course, everything seemed bigger when I was a kid, but it was all there. It was emotional.”
Exeter was where his love of music was born. He recalls a pivotal moment at school, thanks to an unconventional PE teacher.
“Mr Newell, he was an ex-hippie, I think, used to play music before class.
“One day he put on Pink Floyd’s Welcome to the Machine. I remember lying on the mat, listening, and just being completely transfixed.
“That was it, that was the moment I knew I had to do something with music.”
Brown also spent hours in a local record shop, Pitts, where he would queue up to sit in the listening booths.
“It was like a padded white cell,” he laughs.
“You’d go in, pick a song, and just sit there, soaking it in until someone kicked you out. Those experiences were foundational.”
Dom Brown in the park where he used to sledge in the snow as a child
Brown’s early influences were steeped in classic rock: Pink Floyd, Hendrix, Jimmy Page, Queen, and, later, blues legends like Stevie Ray Vaughan. His parents’ record collection, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, also left a mark.
Fast forward to 21 years ago, and Brown found himself stepping into the world of Duran Duran.
Brown became Duran Duran’s guitarist after filling in for Andy Taylor in 2004, initially as a temporary replacement and then as a full-time touring member in 2006.
“It was a whirlwind,” he said. “I got a call on a Wednesday from their tour manager, asking if I could play with them that Friday.
“I met John and Roger Taylor that night, jammed with them in a studio. They were testing me playing riffs, seeing if I could keep up.”
John Taylor handed him a stack of CDs, nine or 10 albums’ worth of material, with about 20 songs marked up.
“I stayed up most of the night learning them,” Brown recalled.
“The next day, I was back in the studio with John and Roger, running through everything. Nick and Simon were in Europe doing promo, so there weren’t even any vocals.
“Then I met them in Tunbridge Wells, we ran through the set once and then we did the show. It was an absolute whirlwind.”
Getty Images
Duran Duran with Simon Le Bon, John Taylor and Andy Taylor
Since then, Brown has become a core part of the band’s sound, recording on several albums, co-writing songs, and touring the world.
“There’ve been so many highlights,” he said. “Playing Madison Square Garden, the Hollywood Bowl, the Concert for Diana in 2007 and Live 8 in 2005.
“But the standout for me was headlining BST Hyde Park in 2022, 75,000 people in my now home town. That was unforgettable.”
And now, another special moment awaits.
“Playing Powderham Castle, here in Exeter, where it all began, it’s going to be emotional,” he said.
“I’m trying not to put too much pressure on it, but I know there’ll be a special energy in the air. I can already feel it.”
Despite his global career, Brown still feels a deep connection to Exeter.
“These were my formative years,” he says. “At that age, a year feels like a lifetime. So spending eight years here, it’s a major part of who I am.”
When he’s not touring with Duran Duran, Brown keeps busy in London, where he runs his own studio and performs with his covers band, Uncovered: The Electric Rock Experience.
“We play the music I grew up with, Zeppelin, Hendrix, Bowie. It’s a joy.”
As the lights go up tonight at Powderham Castle later, Brown will not just be playing another show.
Choreographer Dan Daw and the dancers from Candoco are celebrating and politicising the dancefloor, looking for freedom and to shake up the system. Over and Over (and Over Again) is set in a club, to a soundtrack of house, drum’n’bass and dubstep, but it’s not exactly a feelgood bop-along, it’s more nuanced, more thoughtful and a bit less fun than that.
Candoco are a long-running integrated company with disabled and non-disabled dancers. We’re told at the outset that anyone can take a break when they need to and that means the audience and also the dancers, especially one who is currently dealing with pain. This is not a forum for pushing through pain, they say. Like so many things Candoco have done, that’s a quietly revolutionary statement, when pushing through pain is usually seen as a given for dancers.
‘Rest as an act of resistance’ … Annie Edwards in Over and Over (and Over Again). Photograph: Hugo Glendinning
Throughout the show, parallels are drawn between the life of the club and the lives of the performers, with projected titles: struggle, desire, solidarity. There’s a section labelled “chill-out”, with the dancers all cuddled together on a beanbag and a definition flashes up on the backdrop: “rest as an act of resistance”. There is a lot of gentle resistance happening here, resistance to expectations, the sense of doing things on your own terms. Often there’s not that much happening at all. The dancing feels as much for the dancers as the audience, although there’s pleasure watching Annie Edwards as the beats of the music pulse around her body, or the wild streak of the always excellent Temitope Ajose.
The show doesn’t quite work as a rousing call to the dancefloor, but it has some stand-out scenes, such as Maiya Leeke becoming a human disco ball as the spotlight reflects off her mirrored top, arms flung wide, soaking up the vocalist’s insistent lyric: “I want to feel everything!” It captures that paradox of the dancefloor, when you’re completely in your body, in the moment, yet melted into the music, the self having dissolved. When the lights in the club come up, one lone dancer is left behind. James Olivo warms up into a churning, exploratory solo that finally digs deep. It’s a real moment of finding yourself on the dancefloor, with not a disco light in sight.
There are 17 ticket stubs going under the hammer at Richard Winterton auctioneers
Ticket stubs for 1960s gigs by The Beatles that cost pennies at the time are among a collection expected to fetch up to £500 at auction.
The 17-stub archive includes two for The Beatles and Roy Orbison at Birmingham Town Hall in June 1963, costing fans eight shillings and sixpence.
The Liverpool band was originally second on the bill, but were bumped up to co-headline as Beatlemania grew and ended up closing the set.
Richard Winterton Auctioneers described the “rare and nostalgic collection”, which spans performances between 1962 and 1964, as a “wonderful piece of music history”.
Of the 17 tickets, 16 are for performances in Birmingham and also include The Beatles’ first outing at the city’s Odeon, on 11 October 1964.
There are additional stubs for The Cliff Richard Show at the Hippodrome, The Searchers at the Odeon, and Brenda Lee at the Town Hall.
One stub reveals the owner snagged a balcony seat for an unnamed performance, at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, for just 7 shillings.
In addition, there is a complete ticket for Jazz 1963 at Birmingham Town Hall, presented by The Musicians’ Union and The Labour Party, in October 1963.
PA Media
In 1963, Beatlemania was taking over the UK, just months before it would do the same in the US during the band’s first visit, in February 1964
“Two ticket stubs for The Beatles at the height of Beatlemania are especially evocative – how incredible it must have been to see the Fab Four live in 1963 and 1964,” a spokesperson for the auctioneers said.
“With a host of other iconic names in the collection, this is a wonderful piece of music history.”
The stubs will go under the hammer on 14 July, at the Lichfield Auction Centre in Fradley Park.
