Yet another public-art caper involving an enormous head has befallen Durango, but this time, it has the potential to damage Durango’s standing in the international community.
An unknown person or persons Thursday stuck a Chinese dragon head atop the “Arc of History,” a divisive public artwork at the U.S. Highway 550/160 intersection that entails many rocks suspended on a metal kebob. While the vandals’ intentions were unclear, some Durango residents initially interpreted their crime as motivated by a desire to commemorate the Chinese New Year.
Durango Police Department’s Lt. Ray Shupe said police have no suspects.
“Arc of History” has a history of being desecrated by obscure reptile heads.
Last Halloween, an anonymous artist caused a sensation when he mounted a dinosaur head atop the oft-ridiculed sculpture – an act Durango Police Department spokesman Lt. Ray Shupe promptly characterized as vandalism of city property.
Immediately, the public bellowed for police to return the dinosaur head to “Arc of History.” But police refused, saying the sculpture belonged to the city of Durango and the dinosaur head was not part of the work.
This logic did not please many Durango residents, whose feelings about “Arc of History” have remained intensely skeptical since the city installed the sculpture last summer. The skepticism persists despite city officials’ oft-repeated assurances that locals would warm to the artwork with time.
During the dinosaur-head kerfuffle, Jeff Corr commented on Facebook that, “If this was desecration of public property, having that turd statue in our town without the head is desecrating the city of Durango. It actually completed the ‘artwork’ and made it something interesting instead of ugly.”
It’s too soon to tell whether the public will embrace the dragon head with the same fervency that the dinosaur head inspired.
City officials did not respond to repeated requests for comment about how they intend to deal with the dragon head.
Yet removing the dragon head from the sculpture may have geopolitical ramifications.
According to Mythological Creatures Around the World, in China, it is taboo to disfigure depictions of dragons, meaning if the city were to slay the dragon head, it might risk offending Chinese sensibilities, causing Durango to appear culturally insensitive on the world stage.
As of Thursday evening, attempts to reach the Chinese Embassy in Washington were not successful.
The prospect of decapitating the dragon head places the city of Durango in a tricky diplomatic circumstance.
Bob Kunkel, executive director of the Durango Area Tourism Office, said he didn’t know whether removing the dragon head would cause ripples in China.
Could sundering the dragon head from the “Arc of History” prove inauspicious for Durango’s standing as a global tourist destination?
If the city decides to take down the dragon head, Kunkel said, he didn’t know how China might react. “I have no idea if they would be offended or not. I guess it’s a big country,” he said.
Kunkel didn’t know how many Chinese tourists come to Durango annually.
“Right now, our program doesn’t reach out to China – we don’t have the resources for a marketing campaign there,” he said. “But if they find out about us, we encourage all tourists to come to Durango.”
For Durango, alienating China could be expensive. According to the United Nations World Tourism Organization, in 2013, 83 million mainland Chinese spent $102 billion abroad, surpassing Americans and Germans as the world’s top tourism spenders.
People familiar with modern Chinese mores warned that as a symbol, the dragon is still widely revered by both Chinese and Chinese-Americans.
In a telephone interview, Mimi Feng, with the Chinese American Association – Rocky Mountain Region, said, “the dragon is very important to the Chinese community.”
She said that this Chinese New Year ushers in the year of the sheep, not the dragon, but she added many Chinese would consider the defiling of dragon imagery “very impolite. The Chinese people like dragons.”
On inspection, the dragon head, which is about 2½-feet long, does not appear mass-produced.
Studio &’s Tim Kapustka said as an artwork, the dragon head – much like its predecessor, the dinosaur head – had significant merit.
Analyzing photographs of the dragon head atop the statue, he pointed to the detailing in the horns and mouth, saying such exact work was impressive and would likely require both skill and time. He said the artist’s sense of scale – specifically, the way the dragon head fits with the piece – is also laudable. “It would be difficult to do, especially since the artist didn’t have the “Arc of History” at home to see its proportions,” he said.
“That’s what’s been so great about these heads. They’re both made extremely well,” he said.
Though – as an addition to the sculpture – the dragon head may be illegal, early reviews suggest many Durangoans find the artwork to be successfully executed.
Asked what he thought of the dragon head, Lt. Shupe said, “it looks like a dragon head.”
Midafternoon Thursday, many cars beeped at the “Arc of History.” The honking seemed to signal drivers’ gleeful approval of the dragon head, though it might also indicate strong grass-roots support for closer Durango-Sino relations.
Nancy Shanks, Colorado Department of Transportation Region 5 spokeswoman, said the dragon head had not caused any road accidents.
“I have not seen a report of any accidents caused by a dragon head. Unless our engineers say it starts breathing fire, everyone should be safe,” she said.
cmcallister@durangoherald.com
