Community art piece destroyed

Mike Swanson

The 6-foot orange ceramic fish sculpture placed in front of the Bank

of America on Ocean Avenue in May by the Community Art Project was

destroyed sometime late Saturday or early Sunday.

Municipal Services workers discovered the fish sculpture’s gutted

remains next to its former pedestal and the Styrofoam used to fill it

littering the alley at about 7:30 a.m. Sunday.

The Community Art Project is offering an undisclosed cash reward

to anyone with information about who destroyed the sculpture. The

damage is estimated at $7,000, Laguna Beach Police Sgt. Darin Lenyi

said. Police are investigating.

“My uneducated guess is drunk people coming out of the bars,

seeing this big bright fish and deciding to smash it for some drunk

reason,” said Rebecca Meekma, vice president of the Community Art

Project.

The sculpture, created by artist Cybele Rowe, is the first piece

of art placed by the project to be destroyed, but not the first to be

vandalized, President Julita Jones said. This was the fourth piece

placed at the Bank of America site on Ocean Boulevard and the second

ceramic piece in a row. Pieces are normally replaced after about 12

to 18 months, Jones said.

Jones called the fish sculpture a “controversial piece” because

“it was a little suggestive in terms of its shape,” but said she

couldn’t determine whether its attackers wanted to destroy the fish

specifically or they wanted to destroy anything that happened to be

there.

“I hope we can replace it with another one of Cybele’s pieces,”

Jones said. “But maybe this time, she should use bronze.”

Jones and Meekma said they’d meet with the art selection committee

to discuss what to do next with the site. Jones said she expected the

replacement process to take a while.

The largest remaining part of the fish was connected to the steel

pole that formerly bound the sculpture to its base. The base,

however, wasn’t damaged.

“Whoever did this was either really strong or used something that

helped make them really strong,” Meekma said. “They didn’t quit until

it was rubble.”