CAIRO — Facebook users have been sharing photos of statues erected during 2015 in public squares throughout Egypt. These monuments, however, stirred a wave of anger and mockery among citizens for their artistic level and for not resembling the person they are meant to embody.
These feelings of anger and mockery were particularly evident among the local communities that live in areas surrounding these squares. The inhabitants of the city of Safaga in the Red Sea governorate were hit with a surprise during the unveiling of the Arousa Square monument on Nov. 28. According to some locals, the statue looks nothing like a mermaid as intended, but rather resembles a nightclub dancer. The same thing happened with the inhabitants of Aswan governorate who were horrified by a hideous statue of the great Egyptian writer Abbas El Akkad erected in the Akkad neighborhood of Aswan in early November. As part of a larger development plan for the neighborhood, a public official in the local administration unit restored an original statue initially made by the late Egyptian sculptor Farouk Ibrahim, but following restoration the statue no longer resembled the Egyptian literary giant. Samalout city in the governorate of Minya removed a statue of the pharaonic Queen Nefertiti in July 2015 after a campaign launched by social media activists criticizing the ugliness of this statue that looks nothing like the queen.
On this subject, Mustafa Abdel Muti, the undersecretary of the Ministry of Culture and former president of the Academy of Arts, told Al-Monitor, “The statues in public squares have special characteristics related to the general culture of the people. A certain statue may be a prominent piece of art but belong in a museum and cannot be displayed in public squares as it may violate public decency.”
He added, “A statue aims to perpetuate the memory of a person or specific event and every statue has its own technical specifications and measurements that are integrated with each other. When choosing a statue to be erected in a public square, the urban space must be taken into account, including the adjacent area and the height of surrounding buildings and trees. The materials chosen must also be taken into consideration, including stone or bronze or iron, and must be in harmony with the nature and design of the buildings around the statue.”
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