An Australian teenager has faced court for allegedly defacing a large blue sculpture of a mythical creature by sticking googly eyes on it.
Amelia Vanderhorst, 19, appeared via phone at Mount Gambier Magistrates Court in South Australia on Tuesday charged with one count of property damage.
In a statement at the time of the September incident, the local council said CCTV footage showed a person putting artificial eyes on the artwork which locals have nicknamed the “Blue Blob”.
Perhaps they shouldn’t have used a paint chipper to remove the eyes.
It shouldn’t be a crime if it’s objectively hilarious.
I’m kind of sympathetic to the idea that there should be some sort of fine associated with petty vandalism, but I’ve also seen a number of comments here and elsewhere that it’s unlikely that whatever she did actually required causing this much damage to remove it, and that if it did, the sculpture was poorly designed in the first place. One user on Reddit asked whether, if the city had decided to use dynamite to remove the eyes, she should be liable for all the damage caused by the dynamite. I think that that’s probably a fair point to make. The blame doesn’t need to be entirely on any one party here.
I could see fining her for whatever one might reasonably expect a competent removal to run from a properly-designed artwork, but not dumping costs on her from failures in those other areas.
If i’d paid £68,000 for a statue to be installed outdoors and the coating on it was so thin that the glue on the back of a pair of googly eyes ruined the entire statue, I’d definitely be asking for my money back from the artist
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It was an obvious improvment.
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There was an unfortunate choice in adhesive or removal technique.
Involve her in the repair. look into wth it was so hard to remove them and make the knowledge public so future ‘pranks’ won’t be as bad.
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And that’s why, kids, you should never cheap out and skip primer. This piece won’t last two years of Australian weather before it start chipping, and this kid proof it.
This story was cute until I saw this, if removing the eyes didn’t damage the art it would be harmless but that’s really unfortunate…
That’s shit art is what it is, if you can’t handle googly eyes you weren’t gonna survive the elements
This is on whoever removed the eyes.
There are like two dozen ways to completely dissolve most adhesives.
Or what, did she epoxy them on there?
As an Aussie, I can confidently say we would have preferred the googlies left on
There is a statue in Glasgow that always has a traffic cone on its head.
The council regularly removes it, and its always replaced.
It’s had different variations over the years, from pride to independence to EU flags.
The council proposed a renovation of the statue including raising the plinth to make it harder to replace the cone. It was shot down with massive public outcry.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equestrian_statue_of_the_Duke_of_Wellington,_Glasgow
In 2013, Glasgow City Council put forward plans for a £65,000 restoration project, which included a proposal to double the height of its plinth and raise it to more than six feet (1.8 metres) in height to “deter all but the most determined of vandals”.[12] Their planning application contained an estimate that the cost of removing traffic cones from the statue was £100 per callout, and that this could amount to £10,000 per year.
If the police are taking it down 100 times per year and people are putting a new one up 100 times per year, I’m kind of impressed with the determination on both sides.
Theres also an elk made of straw somehwere in Sweden that gets burned down every year, no matter what kind of security measure they put up. Not sure if I can find it now.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gävle_goat It’s a goat?
