Park Service denies permit for a 45-foot statue of a naked woman on the National Mall
The group had originally been told the statue would be permitted
Adapted from a story by The Washington Post’s Perry Stein.
Earlier this month, the National Park Service said it was “plausible” there would be a statue of a naked woman coming to the National Mall in Washington.
A group organizing the three-day “Catharsis on the Mall” festival — which will still occur — had applied for a permit to place a 16,000-pound statue on the Mall. They even raised upward of $100,000 to transport the artwork, a naked woman hoisted 45 feet into the air, from San Francisco and assemble it on the Mall, where it would stand for four months.
But on Wednesday, the group received a letter from the National Park Service scuttling their plans.
“Using this abysmal excuse to trump our action bringing attention to violence against women shows an unbelievable disregard for the people involved and the First Amendment,” the organizers wrote in an emailed statement to The Washington Post early Thursday.
The statue was present at Burning Man in 2015. Burning Man, the annual desert festival outside Reno, Nev., is known for building a hippie-like community that promotes art, self-expression, inclusiveness and civic engagement.
The federal agency’s justification for denying the permit was the statue’s height — 47 feet total with its base, which is 2 feet over the Mall’s height limit of 45 feet — and because they were concerned that the statue would damage the Mall’s turf.
“The previous height variance was issued to you in error and, to the extent necessary, it is revoked as well,” the letter by Rick Obernesser, acting regional director of the Park Service, read.
Mark Litterst, a Park Service spokesman, said Thursday that the agency also thought the statue would detract from views of the Washington Monument.
“Additionally, the proposed nearly 48-foot height of the statue introduces a visual element that would diminish the property’s significant historic features by altering the setting and historic character of the National Mall landscape,” Litterst wrote in an email.
“Catharsis on the Mall” will take place Nov. 10–12, the third year running for the event in Washington. Each year, the event has revolved around a different theme, with the first two years focusing on healing from the drug war and recovering from trauma. This year’s theme is “nurturing the heart” and equal rights.
The statue, “R-Evolution” by Marco Cochrane, depicts singer and dancer Deja Solis with short, dark hair. Cochrane said Solis posed for the statue and chose how her sculpted self would be positioned.
“We need to show women just being in their bodies, just being humans, as an antidote of the constant sexualization of the women’s body, the constant dehumanization,” Cochrane said earlier this month.
