THE SNOWDEN STATUE
We were aiming to start a conversation. We ended up facing off against the NYPD, inspiring “the youth”, and landing in a museum.
Selected Press
ANIMAL / TIME / Sydney Morning Herald / USA Today / New York Times / Wall Street Journal / New York Post / Mashable / NY Daily News / Gothamist / Brooklyn Paper / Hyperallergic / Good Magazine
How It Started
On April 6, 2015, a friend and I fused a four-foot, 100 pound bust of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to a pillar within the Prison Ship Martyr’s Monument in Brooklyn’s Fort Greene Park, a monument to POWs who lost their lives during the American Revolution.
The Idea
If you co-opt the visual symbols people associate with heroes, you can help them question the dominant narratives they blindly accept.
The (over)Reaction
Amid public swooning, the NYPD threw a tarp over it and hauled it to the slammer.
The Reaction to the Reaction
New Yorkers young and old were outraged. Public outcry led to artists recreating the piece as a hologram. Others left flower tributes.
The Cavalry
To keep the piece from being “lost”, an exhaustive page was created and detailed by editors at Wikipedia.
The Reinforcements
We released a 3D scan of the original bust, to allow anyone to print one. Prints began appearing in public all over the world. Even one made of gold near the Austrian Parliament.
The Salvation
Famed civil rights attorney Ron Kuby stepped forward to defend our rights and got the statue back from the city.
The Aftermath
The statue took a victory lap at several art galleries in NYC before taking it’s rightful place atop a giant pillar in a show at the Brooklyn Museum.
