In Bristol, the statue of a young anti-racist black woman removed

The statue of a demonstrator of the Black Lives Matter movement in Bristol, installed without authorization, was removed on Thursday, July 15 at dawn. The building had been installed the day before to replace that of a slave merchant unbolted during the Black Lives Matter movement.   

Entitled "A Rise in Power", the sculpture by Marc Quinn was installed on the base where the statue of Edward Colston was located by the artist's teams, without the town hall of Bristol doesn't know. 

Black Lives Matter protest statue that secretly replaced Edward Colston removed by Bristol Council https://t.co/qRqelNAfVU

Controversial 

According to the municipality, the statue was removed at his request, specifying that it would be placed in his museum so that its author could recover it or give it to the city's collection. 

Reacting Wednesday to the installation of the work, the mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees, said on Twitter understand that people want to "speak out", but that the statue installed "without authorization" should be removed. 

The large black steel piece represents Jen Reid, a protester who was photographed with her fist raised on the empty plinth of the old statue of Edward Colston, a late 17th century slave trader. 

This statue, which had been controversial for years, had been unbolted and then thrown into the river at the beginning of June, during demonstrations of the Black Lives Matter movement after the death at the end of May of George Floyd, this black American killed by a police officer. 

Sale of slaves  

These demonstrations were accompanied by a series of degradations of statues of personalities, disputed because of their involvement in the slave trade or racist statements. The fate of the statue of Edward Colston, which has since been recovered, had not been determined. 

Edward Colston got rich in the slave trade. He would have sold 100,000 slaves from West Africa to the Caribbean and the Americas between 1672 and 1689, before using his fortune to finance the development of Bristol, which has long earned him a reputation as a philanthropist. 

View this post on Instagram

Today, Bristol resident Jen Reid and I have unveiled a new temporary, public installation, 'A Surge of Power (Jen Reid) 2020', on top of Edward Colston's empty plinth in Bristol, England. This life-sized sculpture is based on an image I saw on Instagram of local resident Jen Reid standing on the vacant plinth with her fist raised in a Black Power salute, a spontaneous moment following a Black Lives Matter protest in June 2020. During the protest , a statue of 17th century slave trader Edward Colston was toppled from this spot. Cast in black resin, this new sculpture 'A Surge of Power (Jen Reid) 2020' takes its place - no formal consent has been sought for the installation. Read the full statement - link in bio. #blacklivesmatter #marcquinnart # 5thplinth

A post shared by marcquinnart (@marcquinnart) on Jul 14, 2020 at 9:55 pm PDT

With AFP

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