The emotional hissy-fit over the Fearless Girl statue continues as one expects.
City sculptor Alex Gardega — seething over the “Fearless Girl” statue being placed across from Wall Street’s “Charging Bull” — has decided to retaliate with a work of his own.
Gardega created a statue of a small dog, titled “Pissing Pug,” and his sloppily crafted pooch takes direct aim at “Fearless Girl” — or, at least, at her left leg.
“This is corporate nonsense,” Gardega told The Post of “Fearless Girl,” saying it was put opposite artist Arturo Di Modica’s famed bull as a publicity stunt by a Boston-based financial firm.
“It has nothing to do with feminism, and it is disrespect to the artist that made the bull,” he said. “That bull had integrity.”
The Upper West Side artist sniffed that he even made his dog particularly poorly just to stick it to “Fearless Girl” even more.
“I decided to build this dog and make it crappy to downgrade the statue, exactly how the girl is a downgrade on the bull.”
Yeah right, buddy. Does anyone really believe he made it crappy deliberately? Does anyone believe he’s “pro-feminism” as he claims? Maybe he’s just creatively and intellectually limited? Because, let’s face it, a urinating dog screams middle school immaturity. Bet he even giggled and snickered as he created this piece. I’m surprised he didn’t sculpt a pile of doggie doo to go with his “art”.
What will his next project focus on? The Wonder Woman movie’s all women viewing?
When you have time to flip out over things like the Fearless Girl statue and the Wonder Women movie I’d say you’re probably living a pretty charmed life.
Hope Gardega doesn’t think this will be well received, let alone advance him or his work. As noted it’s totally a playground move.
The reaction by some men (exemplified by this artist) to the Fearless Girl has been intriguing. Every bit of their pushback demonstrates to me why Fearless Girl needs to be there. Even this artist’s bullying reaction — starting with whinging about the girl changing his work in a way he does not approve and now with this schoolyard insult.
But hey, let’s get the story straight — this artist just made manifest the guardian angel of most women — a man standing on the sidelines pissing on her work.
When an advertising firm decided to use a statue of a little girl to advance the idea of more women on corporate boards because a little girl is, “more relatable than an adult woman,” the entire premise that “Fearless Girl” has anything to do with feminism or empowering women is out the window.
Go stand “Fearless Girl” in front of a little boy statue and put a statue of a grown woman wearing a suit and holding a briefcase in front of the bull instead. That’s empowering for women.
Fearless Girl is nothing more than a daily reminder that being taken seriously as a grown woman in a man’s world is still an uphill battle.
I fail to see how that isn’t a feminist message or an empowering or affirming one.
The statue puts women in their place. Be cute and act fearless, like a little Shirley Temple. She’s so cute and she acts so tough, isn’t it charming and completely non-threatening to men?
Just don’t grow up and become a woman, because then you’re not cute and fearless anymore, then you’re just another shrill bitch taking a man’s job. You’re Hillary Clinton. Unrelatable.
If you want to advance feminism, age the little girl by 30 years and put her in a suit. Stick a grown woman in the face of Wall Street, strong and unafraid, like the women who work on Wall Street today.
And then watch while no one begs to keep the statue there indefinitely.
Well then perhaps you should create your own statue. Because it is quite the leap to call for the girl to be placed in front of an age appropriate boy statue to this statue putting women in their place. If the statue of the girl was so non-threatening, I suspect the artist would not be on a jihad to get rid of it. If the statue was so non threatening, you wouldn’t be here with a different critique of it every time you visit.
Well… given all the comments and reactions, it sure seems like some people are threatened. The “Urinating Dog” artist is only one among many. So, I’d say “Fearless Girl” sends quite a powerful message.
A little girl isn’t threatening, that’s specifically why the advertising firm commissioned one.
And that is why “Fearless Girl” doesn’t portray or advance feminism – the simple fact that the advertising firm that commissioned “Fearless Girl” stated that they wanted a little girl instead of a woman because a little girl is “more relatable.”
Think about that for a minute. You can’t put a statue of a grown woman in a suit in front of the charging bull because a grown woman is unrelatable.
How is replacing a woman with a child feminism? It’s not. It’s the opposite. It’s erecting a statue that will not challenge the delicate sensitivities of men when it comes to women in their sacred workplaces.
It’s the reason why Hillary lost – because our society still cannot “relate” to a grown woman doing serious work among men, and that isn’t going to change as long as we keep being so threatened by grown women that we can’t even use images of grown women to portray grown women.
I’m not sure why “Fearless Girl” can’t send her own message. Many, many people connected with her. And when I look at the over-the-top reaction Wonder Woman is getting I don’t think it makes a difference if the symbol is a girl or a woman.
People connected with Fearless Girl because she was put in the right place at the right time. She is an example of a winning marketing strategy.
And just so you understand, there are artists upset with Fearless Girl not because they are threatened by her, but because she was created by an advertising firm – it was the advertising firm that chose the stance – head up with hands on hips – and they were very careful to not make her too defiant. They even wanted her smaller but a smaller size didn’t work against the Charging Bull. She’s basically the equivalent of the Cheetos Cheetah – and you’re not going to find a lot of artists who would call that art or who would embrace their own artwork’s meaning being changed by a clever marketing scheme.
This would be bullshit. First. Global State Street Advisors is not an advertising firm. Second, you clearly don’t understand the concept of “commissioned” work. Your clients interact with the design until you both agree to the vision and the end result. Third, plenty of artists do praise this bit of art — except the misogynistic ones, of course. Last:
who would embrace their own artwork’s meaning being changed by a clever marketing scheme.
Not a clever marketing scheme, but a thing called appropriation. A thing that Andy Warhol, Richard Price, Dara Birnbaum, Jeff Koons and others have done wit varying levels of success.
The story of this piece of art is here. State Street has a long history of pushing corporate boards to include more women and they have an excellent platform to do that. This statue helped them amplify that message rather well.
Global State Street Advisors hired the advertising firm McCann (of Mad Men fame) to develop their campaign. “Fearless Girl” is an advertising campaign, just like Chester Cheeto.
As for State Street, having a “long history of pushing corporate boards to include more women,” no, they don’t. This is a new push by State Street. In fact State Street only has 3 women on their own Board of Directors and only 5 women on their leadership team. They do have a long history of pushing corporate boards to do things, but the woman angle is new.
I understand why you want to feel this way about Fearless Girl, but as long as it’s more “relatable” to use a little girl instead of a grown woman, we’ll get no where. Use a woman to portray a woman. That advances women.
But your claim that it was an ad firm:
but because she was created by an advertising firm – it was the advertising firm that chose the stance
did the work that SSAG did. Which is dead wrong. The ad firm as hired to create their campaign around diversity on boards for International Women’s Day.
But until you get a little more fluent than the Fox News bullshit you’ve been espousing here, we’re done here. You are clearly more interested in perpetuating the usual patriarchal order and certainly not in a serious investment firm asking some of the businesses it invests in for better behavior.
“It’s the reason why Hillary lost – because our society still cannot “relate” to a grown woman doing serious work among men,..” – W in a M’s W
Hillary lost b/c she was at best, an unexceptional Senator and, as any M or W from Libya or Honduras will tell you, a horrific Secretary of State.
I’m not seeing how “Fearless Girl” throws feminism and empowering women out the window. The statue is powerful.
I explain it clearly above.
🙄
When I said the advertising firm “created the stance” I was talking about the way “Fearless Girl” was standing , not SS’s stance on more women on boards.
Next, I don’t watch Fox News.
Finally, as far as my “perpetuating the usual patriarchal order,” I have been fighting that “patriarchal order” every damn day for over 30 long years at virtually every f*cking job I’ve ever had.
And that, my friend, is why I’m so freaking pissed off at the use of a little girl instead of a grown woman. I’m not a fearless little girl, I’m a competent grown woman and I resent the fact that a statue of a working woman wasn’t “relatable” enough for State Street and McCann and apparently the buffoons on Wall Street.
Well, my friend, you will be a whole lot more engaged with this world if you understood the business of metaphor. Which is one of the big things that powers art everywhere. It is the metaphor here that has powered this image across the world. If you need a literal representation, get yourself a photo. But you’ll need to stop commenting on art of any kind if you have no appreciation of metaphor.
I am truly surprised that you can’t understand how deeply demeaning Fearless Girl is to professional women.
I am a professional woman. A professional woman who gets how metaphor works. I am certainly not demeaned by this installation. And judging by all of the professional women of my acquaintance who have taken joyful selfies with this stature, I’d say your reaction is a definite outlier.
I don’t think of “feminism” at all when I see the statue. I see the statue as the frailest of human kind having the courage to stand up to the corporate world, possibly the greed of the corporate world.
Sometimes these things take on their own meaning, irrespective of the original intent.
I liked Fearless Girl precisely because it made more obvious that the bull is a malignant force.
I like the blog title. It would be even better if you replaced “crappy” with “pissy” each time.