A 12-foot-tall bust of Elon Musk in Texas was defaced over the weekend, in keeping with the proprietor of the property the place the paintings is positioned.
The landowner, Eleazar Villafranca, instructed ABC Information that passersby alerted him on Saturday to the injury, and, on Monday, he confirmed in-person deep gouges on the bust’s eye, chin, and again.
“There are like three or 4 items they minimize with a knife,” Villafranca stated, including that it was constructed from a rubbery materials.
The work has been sitting on Villafranca’s property for near a 12 months, he stated. Villafranca added that he reached out to the artist behind the bust concerning the vandalism, however having obtained no response, requested one other artist to restore the paintings.
The Cameron County Sheriff’s Workplace was additionally notified of the incident, although no suspect has been recognized.
The statue seems to be the identical one which was towed behind a Tesla Cybertruck in Brownsville, Texas, final summer season. On the time, a French tech entrepreneur who glided by the identify “Louis XXII” instructed ARTnews that he had commissioned the work to convey visibility to a viral meme of a foul drawing of Musk posted on Reddit six years in the past.
That is solely the most recent in a string of vandalism focusing on symbols of the Tesla CEO and White Home advisor since he successfully took management of the Trump administration’s Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE). On the helm of DOGE, Musk has pursued dramatic federal workers reductions and broad finances cuts whereas investing hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in a conservative candidate for Wisconsin’s Supreme Court docket election. That courtroom is ready to deliberate on a lawsuit concerning opening Tesla dealerships within the state.
The Trump administration, in the meantime, has devoted vital assets towards pressuring arts and tradition establishments to align with its priorities and beliefs by way of government orders and funding cuts. Staffers on the Institute of Museum and Library Providers, which offers assets to museums and libraries throughout the US, have been placed on depart by DOGE earlier this month. Additionally this month, DOGE advisable that the Nationwide Endowment for the Humanities minimize as much as 80 p.c of its workers, and lots of grant recipients reported receiving cancellation of their grants.
