YOKO ONO returned to Liverpool yesterday for a whistle-stop visit to see how her own Biennial exhibition has taken shape.

Skyladders for Liverpool 08 takes a recurring theme of the 75- year-old artist’s work and places it in the evocative surroundings of St Luke’s bombed-out church in the city centre.

“The Skyladders was originally a piece I dedicated to John, John Lennon,” she clarifies softly, as if any explanation were necessary.

“I really loved this church and wanted to do it there because it is an incredible monument.

“You can say it is kind of a sculpture in itself, expressing the historical disaster and all of that.

“Skyladders is trying to reach the sky, and at the same time I think it is a very good celebration.

“It is also getting to be so expressive as people put words on those little cards.

“For me, it has sort of a private memory about it as well.”

The Skyladders concept first came to Ono in the 1960s. Regard- ed at the time as avant-garde, she said it was “amazing” that Lennon connected with it and understood.

Since the 1980s, Ono has con- structed her Skyladders pieces using stepladders donated by the public.

It was following the murder of Lennon, she says, that she “really started to feel the togetherness of all of us, missing John and going through this tremendously tragic thing.

“It’s great, even from the begin- ning it was a performance art event where people would gather and do something, that was an important part of it. It is so beau- tiful,” she said. “It’s really such an honour to be asked to do this, I’m very pleased.”

It is a welcome return to the Biennial for Ono. She last exhibit- ed in 2004 with My Mummy Was Beautiful, a public work of photo- graphs of isolated parts of the female form which caused some consternation.

“I was stoned,” she giggles. “Well, there’s two meanings for that word. But some people felt it was not proper and some people liked it.

“It became a very controversial work, which I didn’t expect it to be.”

Biennial organisers now believe the fact that there was no political interference in the debate over My Mummy Was Beautiful paved the way for the city’s Capital of Culture success.

Ono has been no stranger to the city in 2008, visiting for an exhib- ition of John Lennon’s artwork and Paul McCartney’s Liverpool Sound concert in June, and earlier to mark the re-opening of the Bluecoat with a one-off perform- ance, 41 years after first appearing at the venue. I enjoyed that immensely,” she smiles, remem- bering how she got the crowd standing to “dance for peace”.

“I just wanted to give some kind of excitement, and inspire people.”

John Lennon featured heavily in the retrospective piece of performance art, but Ono says she doesn’t know what he would have made of 2008.

“But the point is John was very proud of Liverpool.

“He was always comparing it to New York city. He couldn’t forget it.

“I have a definite connection to Liverpool because of John and John’s childhood and that he was formed in this particular city.

“It’s very important in that sense, but at the same time if I didn’t like the city I wouldn’t come, whether John was born here or not.

“It is an incredible city with incredible people and definitely, I feel, people are feeling much stronger about themselves.”