Australian Teen Faces Charges for Allegedly Placing Sticker Eyes on ‘Cast in Blue’ Artwork
A young person from the Land Down Under has faced legal proceedings after reportedly defacing a sizable art piece of a legendary being by applying googly eyes to it.
The 19-year-old, aged 19, appeared via phone at Mount Gambier Magistrates Court in South Australia on that day, facing with one count of damaging property.
In a statement at the moment of the September incident, the local council explained that CCTV footage captured a individual putting artificial eyes on the artwork, which locals have dubbed the “Blue Blob”.
Ms Vanderhorst made no plea and told the judge she was unwell, as reported by news outlets, with the judge advising her to secure a lawyer before her upcoming hearing in the final month of the year.
A day after the reported event, the local mayor said that restoration to the much-loved community sculpture would be expensive as the stickers could not be removed without harming the art piece.
“This wilful damage to a valued community art is unacceptable and disrespectful,” Mayor Lynette Martin remarked in September. “It is not innocent amusement, it is costly - it is also frustrating to those members of our community who have embraced the Blue Blob.”
She added the council would pursue the “substantial” repair costs from those accountable for the vandalism.
When the artwork was first proposed, it drew varied responses from the area residents due to its cost and appearance.
Priced at 136,000 Australian dollars ($89,000; sixty-eight thousand pounds), the sculpture represents a mythical megafauna, with the creators inspired by an prehistoric marsupial ant-eater found in local caves that was “huge, slow-moving, and intriguing”.
