By Judi McLeod ——Bio and Archives--September 17, 2019
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It’s not denuding the Big Apple’s Central Park of male statues making room for female ones on which the Public Design Commission should be spending its time, but how to keep droves of live people from fleeing New York by day.
“The city’s monument “men” are in peril. (New York Post, Sept. 16, 2019)“A member of the commission that oversees art and architecture on city property suggested Monday that instead of simply adding statues of historical female figures to Central Park, the panel yank out some of the male ones first. “There are what, five or six [male] statutes that I think could easily be replaced by individual statues of each of these women,” said Hank Willis Thomas, a painter who serves on the Public Design Commission, at a hearing at City Hall."Whatever will park birds do without statues of Scottish poet Robert Burns, in the park’s Literary Row, and the one of Christopher Columbus in the park, near the famed second one of the explorer in Columbus Circle? Will they now (Heaven forbid!) perch on the female statues that replace them?
“I don’t think that there are many people who will miss the Burns statute, or some people may not miss the Columbus statue if there’s another one just a few hundred yards away,” Thomas said.” (NY Post)Nor will they likely as most people going to Central Park see it as just a walk in the park.
“But Mayor Bill de Blasio — who created monumental hoopla when he opened the door to possibly removing what some groups deemed offensive statues by creating an advisory panel — refused to back the notion.” (NY Post)Well that’s where he stands on the issue for today. It was de Blasio who hand-picked Thomas and the rest of the 10 commissioners on the panel in the first place. Earth to Hizzoner: One million people have fled New York City and the tri-state area—which encompasses New Jersey, Connecticut and Long Island—in the last nine years” (Forbes, Sept. 5, 2019). And not a single one of them left because their political sensibilities were highly offended because male statues can be found lurking in Central Park—even though Central Park currently has 23 statues — all male.
“According to Bloomberg, almost 300 people are moving out of the area per day. "This trend is not exclusive to the New York metropolitan area. Many similar regions are seeing their residents migrate to other states. Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco, as well as Connecticut’s Hartford, Bridgeport and New Haven, have all experienced a substantial exodus of people.”
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“If you live in NYC, you are forced to pay exorbitant taxes. The schools, bridges, tunnels, trains, airports and hospitals are falling apart. Casually walk the streets of NYC and you’ll notice that they are crowded and dirty. It's likely that you’ll see or be confronted by homeless people who clearly display symptoms of serious yet untreated mental or physical issues. The politicians running the city feel that it's more humane to let them to live on the streets, as opposed to being treated in appropriate facilities. The crime rate has risen. To top off the misery, it's cold and snowy in the winter and oppressively hot and humid in the summer.” (Forbes)Meanwhile, don’t expect a resolution for how to get more female statues in the park anytime soon, because Commission members are already squabbling about there not being an inclusion for a Woman of Color statue in the mix. Why not statues of Squad members Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley surrounding a statue of their publicity hound leader Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (AOC)? No one’s more New York than AOC and the park birds love perching.
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