First impressions: Dutch artist Jon Boetes is well meaning, if not a little mad. Arriving at Mamallapuram in Tamil Nadu, India’s southern most state, I was intrigued by its eclecticism of beach, backpackers, temples and the fact that it is considered the stone carving capital of India.

Commissions from home and abroad employ around 3000 carvers in the town. Their work is sent to stately homes, temples and grand hotels with sculptures crafted from the notoriously hard black granite unique to the region.

Mamallapuram is characterised by the gentle cacophony a thousand chisels tapping away inside studios crammed into any crevice available. In this town, it is the master sculptor who attains respect; instead of playing cricket, aspiring children are found chiselling stone by the roadside.

So it came as no surprise that the first person I met while sitting on the beach sipping a mango lassi was in fact a sculptor in the portly form of Jon Boetes. He shortly let on that for the past 15 years he has been working of a series of statues to fill ‘a universal peace park’ which will exist (rather mysteriously) ‘somewhere in this world’.

Jon began to dazzle me with an account of his work to date. The 63 year-old artist and his team of 15 sculptors have already completed 20 of the statues of men and women who stood for “peace, love and courage”. He plans to complete 60 more.

The excitable artist soon had us speeding through town in the back of an auto rickshaw, headed to his studio on the outskirts of town. Jon greeted friends and children in the street as we hurtled along. They returned his salutations with equal warmth, highlighting then reason why (after travelling through over 80 countries in 31 years) he had chosen India and Mamallapuram to fulfil his mammoth sculpting destiny. His charisma and soft intensity are convincing: if anyone could complete this grand dream it is this paunched-bellied local hero. The rickshaw skidded to an abrupt halt – we had arrived at Jon Boetes studio.

Tumbling out onto the street, Jon dished out more ribbings along with payment to the confused driver. Immediately I was face to face with Lady Diana, the last person I expected to be meet. Recently completed, she sat at the entrance to the grounds, her dignified kindness caught perfectly in stone form. Lovingly draped over her were effigies of William and Harry. “I could not bear to separate her from her them,” says Jon, “it seemed somehow inhumane.”

On into the grounds and I am confronted with equally highly-crafted and mesmerising pieces. Amongst them are Mahatma Gandhi (adorned in garlands of flowers by locals), Mother Teresa (also adorned), Audrey Hepburn, John F. Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe. Other characters occupy the yard in various states of completion included Abraham Lincoln, Vitzak Rabin, Anwar Sadat, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King and John Lennon. With each piece weighing in at an awesome 1.5 to 2 tonnes, the thought of transportation seems and gigantic prospect.

I now realise that I am witness not only to a crazy dream but also to a realistic project well on its way to completion. I inundate Jon with questions: where? when? why? The beaming 63 year old, realising that he has lit a spark of inspiration, explains his motives. He has draw inspiration from a number of sources. The most difficult and moving is from his daughter Jody Lee, who was in a coma for six years after an accident on a bicycle. Although her awakening was deemed as miraculous, recuperation was an arduous struggle and when one day she asked her father “Will I ever find peace in this life?” he silently pledged to create such a place of peace dedicated to his daughter.

The idea gained form when, years later, he attended a charity concert in which Barbara Streisand was singing. She dedicated the song ‘Somewhere’, which promotes forgiveness to the “memories of all those good men whose lives have senselessly and violently been snuffed out like a candle”. It was at that precise moment that he realised his calling was to bring these people together in a space of universal peace where their lives and deaths could be reflected upon and thus the idea for the peace park was fully formed. So much so that he has dedicated his life to it. Given the stage his dream it is at, reality seems assured.

Location of the peace park has not been decided. “The universe will provide one – it’s provided everything else up till now so why should it change course?”