A New York City courthouse has erected a golden statue of what has been described as “demon Ruth Bader Ginsburg,” as part of an “urgent and necessary cultural reckoning.”
The statue, known as “Now,” was installed last week to the top of the building that houses the New York State Supreme Court’s Appellate Division in the Flatiron district. The statue, which emerges from a “pink lotus flower,” has the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s signature collar, and “hair braided like spiralling horns,” standing 8 feet tall.
“Now” stands next to statues of classical lawmakers from throughout history, including Confucius, Moses, and Zoraster.
Pakistani-born artist Shahzia Sikander told the New York Times that her statue was part of an “urgent and necessary cultural reckoning underway as New York… reconsiders traditional representations of power in public spaces and recasts civic structures to better reflect 21st-century social mores.”
A new statue atop a New York City courthouse. The artist says it’s part of an “urgent and necessary cultural reckoning underway as New York reconsiders traditional representations of power in public spaces and recasts civic structures to better reflect 21st-century social mores.” pic.twitter.com/4IFRj7hCsf
— Andrew Beck (@AndrewBeckUSA) January 25, 2023
“She is a fierce woman and a form of resistance in a space that has historically been dominated by patriarchal representation,” Sikander explained, noting that her aim was to help “feminise” the courthouse that had been standing since 1896.
The statue gained its title of “Now,” because the pro-woman artwork was needed “now,” after the reversal of Roe v. Wade last year. “With Ginsburg’s death and the reversal of Roe, there was a setback to women’s constitutional progress,” Sikander said in her artist’s statement.
Justice Dianne Renwick, said that since George Floyd’s death and the BLM riots in 2020, the court started to address “gender and racial bias”in those honoured in statues and areas around the courthouse. Renwick told the New York Times that the golden statue “gave her a feeling of contentment and pride” when she looks at it.
“We finally have a figure who fully embraces women,” Renwick said. “I cannot come into the courthouse without stepping back and looking up and smiling.”
However, reaction online was not so positive, with Trump advisor Stephen Miller calling it a “visual desectraion of the landscape,” and others labelling it “demon Ruth Bader Ginsburg,” or “satanic.” Some compared the statue to the Boston statue unveiled that was meant to look like Martin Luther King Jr and his wife, but has instead been compared to a penis.
What an ironic, unintentional admission about the state of the US
Adorning a New York Courthouse are great legal figures such as Solon, Lycurgus, Moses, & St. Justinian
Now, side by side with them, there's demon-ruth bader ginsburg
"Secularism isnt a religion" pic.twitter.com/LEV3Hrwk60
— PalamismRespecter (@PalamismRspctr) January 25, 2023
The destruction of tradition must include the desecration of landscape.
— Andrew Beck (@AndrewBeckUSA) January 25, 2023
Well… 😬
— Andrew Beck (@AndrewBeckUSA) January 25, 2023
— Prison Mitch (@MidnightMitch) January 25, 2023
they even did her horns i mean hair right 😂
this is just comically satanic at this point https://t.co/fo6bHnNO46
— CheeseSqueeze 🚍 (@cheesesqueese) January 26, 2023
