Removed in 2023, the iconic statue of Colombia’s fire hydrant lies on it in a field. Why?

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It has been two years since the Colombia icon was removed and transferred.

The Buscat plug, the 40-foot statue of the fire hydrant, which has been sitting near the intersection of the streets of Taylor and Bull in the center of Colombia for years, is not visible as it was transported around the city on the back of a truck in 2023 after a new owner of the site was sitting.

Today, the sculpture of the local artist Blue Sky can still be seen, only on the other side of the trees behind a locked gate at the end of a dirt road north of the city, where it sits outdoors in an open batch.

Blue Sky expressed his dissatisfaction with the situation, as the work of public art, which spent so much time and effort, creating in essence to disappear.

“They ruined it,” writes the artist under a Facebook post, mourning the absence of sculpture. “They do not intend to return it. My lawyer is working on this. He has not made any progress. This is a deal … a dirty rotting political deal.”

The city of Colombia was adamant that it intended to move the statue. Peyton Lang, a spokesman for the mayor’s office Daniel Renkeman, said the mayor was still firm in the moving plans, but could not confirm a time line or location.

The state has confirmed that Busted Plug is in the field, partly visible from a dirt road leading to the property.

The statue remains in the ownership of the contractor, which removed the sculpture from the city center, said Colombia spokesman Justin Stevens. “He sits on their property,” he said, adding that the sculpture is too large to be stored indoors, but that it is preserved.

Stevens said he still couldn’t say where the statue would be moved because the city still doesn’t know. The most common future will be somewhere on the bank of the Congari River, he said.

The work earlier was sitting the curb, similar to its unattached colleagues from the Water System of Colombia, to the parking lot of the city center, which also features a tunnelvision mural, also painted by Blue Sky. Initially, the sculpture was installed in 2001 to celebrate the anniversary of the Agfirst Farm Credit Bank, and then ended up in the city in 2012 when the bank moved.

Blue Sky told the state that he was proud of the piece and the attention he received from passers -by on Taylor Street, noting that his giant fire hydrant even turned him into the Guinness World Records Book.

“It’s popular as a roadside civil interest,” he said. “This is pop art.”

But after being transferred to the city, he says that Buscan plug has been neglected. His lighting was off and the water characteristic became dysfunctional.

“It was a working fire hydrant,” the artist said. “It was actually pumping water and cost a fortune.”

Blue Sky says he has resisted the city’s effort to move the plug as it was created specifically for the Taylor Street site.

“A project -like project cannot just be downloaded and put somewhere else,” he said. “It was 10 feet underground. Then they just hit it at the ground level. It’s like tearing the tip of the plant and leaving the roots.”

When the property he was sitting on was sold, the city was asked to move Busques’ plug and crowds watched how all £ 675,000 from the sculpture were withdrawn on February 23, 2023.

Currently, Colombia is negotiating a park design on the coast along the Congari River between the Blues and Gervay bridges, part of the long -standing plans to develop the Colombia river. The sculpture can be planned on this site, Stevens said, adding that due to the size of the sculpture, it may be difficult to find space for another part of the river, such as in the Colombia Park.

Last month, the city asked for qualified designers to plan the river park. Stevens said the sculpture could break through these plans, but he did not add anything to the relocation was not finalized.

But Blue Sky doesn’t think the city is really interested in its work of art. About 10 years ago, he thought he had realized that if it was to be moved, the sculpture would go to Finny Park to a site that he chose, but never came from this idea, and the park in the city center itself has now undergone extensive repairs.

“The city has no interest in him,” he said. “What will happen is that when the public interest in him gets out and he just sits there in the field, they will sell him somewhere in California for several thousand dollars.”

This story was updated after an interview with the artist Blue Sky.