Artists Install Massive Bust Of Edward Snowden At Prison Ship Martyrs Monument In Brooklyn
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - That was fast.
CBS2 has learned that a massive bust of Edward Snowden illicitly erected on one of the four columns of the Prison Ship Martyrs Monument in Fort Greene has been taken down.
Photos and video posted on AnimalNewYork.com said the sculpture weighs 100 pounds and was attached in a way that will make it easy to remove.
Ann Preston saw the installment on social media and headed over to check it out.
"But it was gone. It was gone by the time I got here," she told 1010 WINS' Derricke Dennis.
Parks officials had the bust removed sometime in the afternoon after it had been placed there sometime before dawn, Dennis reported.
According to the Animal New York report, the artists called the bust "Prison Ship Martyrs Monument 2.0."
"It would be a dishonor to those memorialized here to not laud those who protect the ideals they fought for, as Edward Snowden has by bringing the NSA's 4th-Amendment-violating surveillance programs to light," the artists behind the installation told Animal New York. "All too often, figures who strive to uphold these ideals have been cast as criminals rather than in bronze."
Click here to see more photos of the installation.
City Removes Artists' Bust Of Edward Snowden Installed At BK Monument
The bust is made of a plaster-like substance called hydrocal. It took about six months and thousands of dollars to produce the bust, according to the report.
"We look at this as a gift to the city, but, you know, gifts are sometimes not accepted," one artist says in a video about the project.
The installation also includes Snowden's name at the base of the column.
"I was a little disappointed that conversation couldn't take place in the community," Preston said after the bust had been removed.
The original Prison Ship's Martyrs Monument commemorates more than 11,500 men and women who died as captives aboard British prison ships during the Revolutionary War.
The Snowden installation was quickly covered over before being removed.
