Black artist Hank Willis Thomas offered a giant Afro pick that tapered to a black power fist at the end of its handle. Titles "All Power To All People," the 800 pound aluminum-and-steel sculpture was provocatively placed near a bronze statue of Frank Rizzo, a former Philadelphia mayor and police commissioner who for many Philadelphians was a symbol of police brutality directed at Blacks and other people of color.
The discussion over history and monuments has continued into 2021, as San Francisco recently scrapped 44 school names.
The issue came to a head last July, when activists forcibly attempted to remove the prominent statue of Columbus in Grant Park, leading to violent clashes between police and protesters. Nearly a week later, Mayor Lightfoot took down Columbus statues in Grant Park and Little Italy. She later had a lesser-known Columbus statue in a South Chicago neighborhood removed.
Columbus has been condemned by activists around the country who point to the Italian explorer's treatment of Indians after he landed in the Americas in 1492.
Many Italians prize the statues of the explorer as an expression of their mainstream American identity.
--Cooter
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