A Shahzia Sikander statue at the University of Houston was vandalized after prior protests by right-wing groups.
The 18-foot-tall bronze monument dedicated to women and justice was beheaded early on July 8, during severe weather and power outages caused by Hurricane Beryl.
Campus police obtained footage of the incident, as reported by the New York Times. “We were disappointed to learn the statue was damaged early Monday morning as Hurricane Beryl was hitting Houston,” said Kevin Quinn, the university’s executive director of media relations, in an email to ARTnews. “The damage is believed to be intentional. The University of Houston Police Department is currently investigating the matter.”
The female figure, with braided hair forming a pair of horns, wears a lacy collar reminiscent of those worn by the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
The sculpture was initially installed at the University of Houston after receiving critical acclaim during a five-month display at Madison Square Park in New York City. However, upon its arrival in Houston, it faced backlash from the anti-abortion Christian group Texas Right to Life, which called for a campus-wide protest to “keep the Satanic abortion idol out of Texas.” In response, the University of Houston canceled the planned opening and artist talk and chose not to display an accompanying video work by Sikander.
It’s important to note that Sikander’s artist statement makes no mention of Satanism. “The rams’ horns are universal symbols of strength and wisdom,” Sikander told Art in America earlier this year. “There is nothing Satanic about them.”
“The calls to remove this proud symbol of female autonomy unintentionally underscored the reason Sikander had created it in the first place,” wrote Eleanor Heartney in her profile of Sikander.
Sikander described the vandalism of Witness as “a very violent act of hate” and told the New York Times that it should be investigated as a crime.
