Prickwillow phone box gets Picasso-inspired makeover

In what has become something of a Christmas tradition in Prickwillow, the village’s telephone box has once again been adorned with a festive covering by artist Cary Outis.

This is the 12th year in a row that Cary has been involved in creating a work of art out of the box – nine of those years he has done it by himself, the other three as part of a small team.

Cary, who runs the Prickwillow Art Space at St Peter’s church in the village along with his wife, said of his design: “It was inspired by Picasso breaking up a fragmentation of how a person looks – or what you recognise as a person, and that for me was connected to the fragmentation of everything this last year.

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“Everything from this ridiculous war in Ukraine to the economic crash, all the price hikes and so on – everything’s fragmented.”

Cary says the artwork took him the “best part of a week, on and off” to finish and reveals that it went up on Friday, December 2. It will stay up throughout December. He adds that the reaction from the villagers so far has been appreciative and enthusiastic.