Prometheus 6

Ultimately they're going to chip off his face entirely.

Architect Requests More Changes to King Statue
By Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 19, 2008; B01

The furrows in Martin Luther King Jr.'s brow already are gone, and his face looks less troubled.

The pen in his left hand is gone, too, replaced by a scroll. His hands seemed etched in more detail, down to the creases in his knuckles and the bones under the skin. There are buttons on his coat sleeves.

The sculpture of the civil rights leader, destined for a memorial on Washington's Tidal Basin, began undergoing these subtle yet noticeable changes even before a federal arts commission expressed its criticism of the model last month. Now it will probably be altered even more.

Ed Jackson Jr., the executive architect on the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial project, said last week that he is sending more modifications to the sculptor in China, who is building a full-scale clay model of the 28-foot sculpture, known as the Stone of Hope.

"If he says it's doable," Jackson said of project sculptor Lei Yixin, adding that if Lei can maintain the integrity of the massive image of King, "then we're willing to do it."

But in an interview last week, Lei expressed irritation at objections the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts has raised to the proposed depiction of King in the Stone of Hope, the centerpiece of the $100 million memorial.

Initially, the arts commission "voted for it unanimously," he said by telephone from his home in Changsha, China. "Now they say my statue is too confrontational.