Marred statue moves to Hot Springs center

— One of the sculptures on display in front of Exchange Street Parking Plaza in downtown Hot Springs was removed after it was vandalized, but it will still be available for public viewing at the Hot Springs Convention Center.

“Essentially the damage was to the bow,” said Darrel DeMoss, of Hot Springs, who sculpted “Marshall,” a fiddle player cast in bronze.

“The first time the bow was bent, I went down there and repaired it the best I could. Just recently someone really wrenched it out of shape; it was severely bent. I brought it back to my studio and have straightened it out as best I can,” DeMoss said Friday.

“I don’t think anyone that had not seen it before would notice it had been damaged,” he said.

The sculpture was moved to the convention center Friday afternoon.

Each year, the Hot Springs Arts Advisory Committee selects sculptures from around the United States to be displayed for six months in front of the parking plaza before purchasing one that will be placed in the city’s sculpture garden near the Transportation Depot, said Carole Katchen, committee chairman.

“This year, one of the sculptures is a great sculpture of a fiddler and it’s been a favorite of a lot of people, but unfortunately, it is also a favorite of people who like to destroy things,” she said.

Katchen said the work of art already had been damaged a couple of times, and “we just decided we couldn’t keep it out in the open anymore because we don’t own it. It’s on loan from the sculptor and we can’t allow his work to be destroyed this way.”

“It makes me really sad because I think the wonderful art we have in the city really adds to the city and the quality of life for everyone - the tourists, and the people that live here,” she said.

“But there continue to be people, and I don’t know why they do it, who keep destroying things.”

Katchen also said sculptured doves, which had been part of Long Hua Xu’s work adorning the water feature at the parking plaza, had been removed because of the amount of damage they had sustained.

“I don’t know what’s going on,” she said. “I don’t know why it happens, why nobody is concerned about this, and I think it’s a terrible statement about our city that people would destroy artwork.”

Katchen said it’s unknown who the vandals are, but “we assume it’s just people who hang out on the street at night when there’s not a lot of traffic and they get bored, then they break things.”

Arkansas, Pages 11 on 07/26/2010

Upcoming Events