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Comment by diamonis | Hacker News Reader

The 'little girl statue' is the artistic equivalent of painting a black mustache on the Mona Lisa with a marker. Pure artistic vandalism.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L.H.O.O.Q.

I know it's not the same thing. But "the Mona Lisa with a mustache" is a work of art.

But I kind of agree with the artist. For some, the space where the artistic object is exposed is as important as the object itself. I can see that the statue of the girl changes the whole space and the bull statue.

I think this could be prevented if they would talk to Di Modica about the new status.

What?? No.

It is the artistic equivalent of putting a mustache sculpture in front of the Mona Lisa.

I have no idea how you could make that comparison. The original artwork was neither destroyed, changed, or touched in any way. It's not in any way like "painting a black mustache on the Mona Lisa with a marker".

It's as if someone hung a picture of a moustache next to a picture of the Mona Lisa. No copyrights remotely violated.

Mashups are fine and I support them, fwiw. But putting 'her' in front of the charging bull is a deliberate attempt to change the meaning of his art. It is the attempt of a second rate artist to ride the coat tails of a superior artist. She gets instant notoriety for her work by, not so coincidentally, trashing somebody elses.

Changing the meaning of an existing piece of art isn't vandalism, it is pure art. As an artist myself I reject your claim that Di Modica is somehow a 'superior artist' just because he happened to have his work there first. Kristen Visbal came up with something everyone who sees it reacts to without needing an intermediaries to draw attention to or explain the semantics of her artistic statement, which is precisely the goal of art.

> Kristen Visbal came up with something everyone who sees it reacts to without needing an intermediaries to draw attention to or explain the semantics of her artistic statement, which is precisely the goal of art.

So a swastika on a war memorial is also "art"?

It's closer to the equivalent of putting the "Three Soldiers" statue right next to the Vietnam Memorial Wall, except those are works of art that actually matter. I'm not so sure about the bronze statues in NY. If my Facebook feed is any guide, the bull is there because people get a kick out of being photographed next to giant testicles.

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