New battle in Bristol over artist’s statue stunt
Black artist criticises Marc Quinn’s bust of protester as mayor says city should pick replacement for Colston
WHEN Marc Quinn erected a likeness of a Black Lives Matter protester where the statue of slave trader Edward Colston once stood, he hoped it would lead to debate.
Perhaps he did not expect the debate to centre on whether a wealthy white artist based in London should assume the right to impose his art on the people of Bristol without asking them first.
Quinn, who made his name as one of the Young British Artists in the Nineties, pulled off the art stunt in a meticulously planned dawn operation.
His sculpture depicts Jen Reid, who was photographed standing on the empty plinth with her fist raised after Colston’s statue was toppled and thrown into Bristol’s docks last month.
He worked in collaboration with Ms Reid, who was thrilled with the result.
But there was no such warm response from Marvin Rees, Bristol’s mayor, who said: “The future of the plinth and what is installed on it must be decided by the people of Bristol.
“The sculpture that has been installed today was the work and decision of a London-based artist.
“It was not requested and permission was not given for it to be installed.” Mr Rees, who is mixed race and the UK’S first directly-elected black mayor, added: “Anything put on the plinth outside of the process we’ve put in place will have to be removed.”
By the afternoon, a makeshift sign had been propped on the new statue reading: “Mark [sic] Quinn loves money not blacks.”
Larry Achiampong, the black British artist, said: “The situation with the Marc Quinn sculpture is a sad joke. The point of all of this is about the redistribution of equity, of power. So simply putting up a sculpture that, yes, looks way better, is not enough.”
He suggested that Quinn could have used his money to “actually support some young black artists to make something and put something up there”, and added: “Sometimes the best thing you can do when you’re part of the problem is just stop.”
However, Ms Reid said: “It’s obviously a compliment and it’s great that Marc has asked me to take part and collaborate with him on doing this. I hope it brings about change. There’s definitely a change in the air and obviously this will keep the conversation going. That’s what I hope.”
Quinn employed a team of 10 people to install the figure, which had been planned for several weeks without the knowledge of Bristol City Council.
The black resin and steel figure was erected in just 15 minutes, using a hydraulic crane truck, and Quinn said it would be “extremely difficult to move”.
Petitions were set up online immediately asking for the statue to remain there permanently, but Quinn said that was not his intention.
“It may be there for a day, it may be there for a week, it may be there for a month. It’s not intended to be the permanent replacement, it’s intended to continue the conversation in the public realm about Black Lives Matter,” he said.
On his website, Quinn said he wanted to use his privilege to be “part of the change”. If the sculpture is sold, all profit will be donated to two charities chosen by Ms Reid: Cargo Classroom and The Black Curriculum, both of which work to address the teaching of black British history in schools.
Anew statue has appeared on the plinth in Bristol left empty when the slaver Edward Colston was pulled down. The replacement is a Black Lives Matter activist involved in the protest. It is extraordinary that the sculptor Marc Quinn has taken it upon himself to dictate who should be honoured. Does he not see the irony of substituting Colston on the grounds that he does not deserve recognition and then deciding who does? Marvin Rees, the mayor of Bristol, says the statue was erected without permission, so it will be interesting to see if it is removed.
The bigger point is how those espousing particular views assume that they are models of rectitude who can dictate the opinions of all. This is a predilection especially apparent among “progressives”, though not exclusively so. They reinforce their world view and imagine it to be universal because they all live in the same social media echo chamber, especially Twitter. The head of BBC editorial standards, David Jordan, fears some of the Corporation’s journalists are “addicted” to the “alluring immediacy” of Twitter. Their contributions risked undermining the BBC’S “reputation for impartiality”, he said.
This trend is worse across the Atlantic, where an opinion editor on the New York Times has resigned, claiming that Twitter has become the newspaper’s ultimate editor. There was no longer a search for truth but the promulgation of “an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else”. In seeking to expose perceived wrongs, self-righteous groups try to shut out any alternative view via censorship techniques like “no platforming”. It is essential for freedom that newspapers and broadcasters do not let them.