Posted on 07/12/2024 6:21:32 AM PDT by Red Badger
It’s unclear whether the attack on Shahzia Sikander’s sculpture is related to protests by anti-abortion groups, which previously denounced it as “satanic.”
Shahzia Sikander's sculpture "Witness" after vandalism on the University of Houston campus (© Shahzia Sikander, photo by Abdurrahman Danquah)
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Artist Shahzia Sikander’s monumental sculpture “Witness” (2023) was beheaded in the early hours of Monday morning, July 8, on the grounds of the University of Houston campus.
The 18-foot-tall sculpture depicting a female figure in a hoop skirt and jabot with braided hair shaped into ram horns and vine-like appendages was installed for a temporary exhibition at the university earlier this year. In February, anti-abortion groups denounced the Pakistani-American artist’s work as a “satanic abortion idol” and threatened to protest the display, resulting in the university’s decision to cancel Sikander’s campus lecture for the opening reception.
“Witness” was vandalized as Hurricane Beryl made landfall along the Texas coast, causing power outages and damages across the campus and city, said Shawn Lindsey, associate vice president of Media Relations for the University of Houston.
“The damage is believed to be intentional. The University of Houston Police Department is currently investigating the matter,” Lindsey told Hyperallergic. “Conservators have also been called in to advise on the necessary repairs. We have been in contact with the artist to repair the artwork as quickly as possible.”
The sculpture’s head is in the university’s possession, a spokesperson confirmed.
Sikander has not yet responded to Hyperallergic’s request for comment.
Detail of Shahzia Sikander, “Witness” (2023) in Madison Square Park, New York (photo Rhea Nayyar/Hyperallergic)
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“Witness” is among three works included in Sikander’s 2023 project Havah … to breathe, air, life, co-commissioned by the Public Art University of Houston System and the Madison Square Park Conservancy, and initially displayed at the park in Manhattan’s Flatiron District.
Referencing the overturning of Roe v. Wade, and the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sikander said in her statement about the project that she sought to capture the “spirit and grit” of the women fighting to maintain rights over their bodies. She added that the works “demand a reimagining of the feminine not simply as Lady Justice with her scale, but of the female as an active agency, a thinker, a participant as well as a witness to the patriarchal history of art and law.”
“We anticipated that on a university campus, a center of learning, there would be important dialogue around ‘Witness’ and the artist’s practice. We did not anticipate this extreme, violent act,” Brooke Kamin Rapaport, the Conservancy’s artistic director and chief curator, told Hyperallergic.
Earlier this month, an artist’s sculpture of the Virgin Mary on view in an Austrian cathedral was also beheaded by an unknown vandal following protests by conservative religious groups who viewed the artwork as “blasphemous.”
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UPDATE:
Shahzia Sikander Says No to Repairing Her Beheaded Sculpture
Her public artwork at the University of Houston was vandalized after anti-abortion activists called it “satanic.”
After Shahzia Sikander’s outdoor sculpture on display at the University of Houston campus was beheaded in the early hours of Monday, July 8, the artist made it clear that she does not want the school to repair the piece.
“Transparency is most important to counter concealment and secrecy,” Sikander wrote in a message to Hyperallergic. “The damage reflects the hateful misogynistic act and it should not be forgotten. It is part of the history of the work and is a testament to the power of art.”
Kevin Quinn, executive director of media relations at the university, told Hyperallergic that the school “respect[s] the artist’s wishes and will leave the sculpture as is.”
Sikander’s “Witness” (2023) is an 18-foot-tall gilded sculpture of a woman with ram horn-shaped braids and tentacular limbs, hovering in mid-air while donning a hoop skirt and a jabot collar in a nod to late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The piece is one of three works co-commissioned in 2023 by the Public Art University of Houston System and the Madison Square Park Conservancy in New York City. Sikander debuted the work at the Manhattan park as a part of the temporary exhibition Havah … to breathe, air, life, before it journeyed to the Texas campus.
In an artist statement, Sikander noted that “Witness” forcibly reinserts women as participants in and spectators of patriarchal law and morality, demanding agency and autonomy through natural elements in light of the overturning of Roe v. Wade and Justice Ginsburg’s 2020 death. When it came time for the works to be installed at the University of Houston campus last February, Sikander and the school were met with intense backlash from far-right, anti-choice lobbyists and organizations that decried the work as a “satanic abortion idol” and petitioned for the exhibition’s cancelation.
As the Texas-based anti-abortion lobbying group Right to Life threatened to protest on campus during the exhibition’s opening reception in late February, the university opted to cancel Sikander’s artist talk onsite and published a document detailing the controversy surrounding the artwork on its website.
Earlier this week, a University of Houston spokesperson told Hyperallergic that the school believes the vandalism of Sikander’s sculpture was “intentional,” noting that the school’s police department reviewed footage of the incident and is currently conducting an investigation.
Despite the messaging from the school, some remain under the impression that the sculpture was damaged by Hurricane Beryl as the storm made landfall in the city early on Monday.
Neither the university nor its police department immediately responded to Hyperallergic’s request to view the footage, and have not confirmed whether they will publicly release it. Sikander told Hyperallergic that she also requested access to the footage and has not yet received it.
If sawed off there would be saw marks.
The Venus de Milo is headless and limbless. She is a treasure. This monstrosity looks better without the head.
Yeah, I had no idea they were beheading women at the U of Houston.
Too bad those creepy tentacle arms weren’t also vandalized or blown off in the storm.
I had the IDENTICAL reaction to the headline. Took a moment to come up with the alternate interpretation. Remember when they taught us to read newspaper articles with care back in grammar school. I have a feeling that the headline writers never took that class.
You beat me to it. Inside job by abortion advocates.
= she got paid and the check cleared.
As opposed to 'accidental vandalism'?
Same here, which is what made me click on the piece. Idiots in journalism these days.
Good. It has a satanic hairstyle. Sick.
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