MICHAEL Hevesi is a man thinking big.

The Winchester sculptor's Corridor of Life idea is now 10 years in the making and there is still plenty of work to be done.

This month, he is letting people into his garden in Weeke to see 30 of the sculptures that will be part of the Corridor.

His eventual vision is to house 240 sculptures inside a double-helix building that he has designed, with a further 80 for its parkland setting, along with 88 sculpture chairs.

A grand design, then, and the idea of exhibiting them in his garden was to give a feeling of what they would look like in parkland.

Michael, 54, explained: "I started doing these figures in 1986 and after a number of years of producing maybe 50 figures, I thought I needed to house them in what I called an ark of creativity. I called it the Corridor of Life.

"The Corridor is made up of 16 series, 13 of which are in the Corridor building itself and the other four series will be in parkland.

"If you look at the sculptures in one direction you see coloured sculptures, but if you walk in the opposite direction you see black and white sculptures."

He has lived in Stoney Lane with his mother, Beryl Morina, for almost nine years, having moved down from Barnes in London.

Michael said that, when it is constructed, his double-helix building would be the equivalent length of the distance between Andover Road and Fromond Road in Weeke. The sculptures, in wood, steel and aluminium, that he has put up in his garden include a footballer, mime artist, ballerina and a gardener, to name but a few.

They were exhibited in a gallery in Cork Street, London, three years ago.

The next phase is to continue work on the 16 series, the next being 20 sculptures with a dance theme, influenced by his mother, who was a ballerina.

But he said he couldn't put a timescale on when the final Corridor of Life would be realised.

"I don't know anybody of influence who would take it up; I have to do it stage by stage, see whether there's an art gallery involved or a stately home that would be interested in displaying a procession of 20 dancing figures," he said.

Visitors can go along to Michael's home at Woodstock, 12 Stoney Lane, Weeke, until June 27, between 9am and 7pm each day.