According to the design plans, the 4.5-million-peso ($US253,000) work “Arbol Adentro” — will feature a four-meter tall, bronze human head, minus a cranium, out of which sprouts a tree.
The sculpture will be erected in downtown’s Jardin Aranzazu, the cozy plaza housing the San Francisco and Nuestra Señora de Aranzazú churches.
“It’s an important, monumental work that will be in a strategic part of the city center,” Alfaro said. “People will be amazed. It’s really spectacular.”
The sculpture will be interactive and have an access ladder at the back for the public, according to Susana Chavez Brandon, head of the municipal culture department.
There has been disquiet in some quarters since Fors was a prominent backer of Alfaro in his mayoral campaign in 2015, and created a musical theme for the Movimiento Ciudadano (MC) candidate.
Santiago Baeza, an artist and former director of culture in Guadalajara, described the commission as “political payback.”
Alfaro reminded critics that the city council approved an urban sculpture program a year ago and is supporting seven other Guadalajara artists, not just Fors. Most of them are established names in the local art scene.
The 30 million pesos of funding for the project, called “Arte Publico,” also includes the
restoration of several existing works. The money is not coming out of the city’s regular budget but through fines collected from developers who have infringed the city’s building codes.
Fors’ work, however, probably won’t be the most expensive of the project’s commissions. That honor may go to Ismael Vargas, whose planned sculpture “Sincretismo” in the central divider of Calzada Federalismo between Hospital and Javier Álvarez has an estimated – yet to be approved – budget of more than five million pesos. The other six artists invited to create works are Javier Arévalo, Mario Martín del Campo, Dolores Ortíz, Pedro Escapa, Jorge Méndez Blake and Jose Dávila.
Alfaro stressed that the project is completely different from the Millennium Arches fiasco commissioned in 1998.
Developed by iconic Mexican sculptor Sebastian and situated at the convergence of Lazaro Cardenas and Mariano Otero, the six giant arches were supposed to be finished on time for the turn of the millennium. In the end, the project went way over budget, and only four arches were completed more than three years after the original deadline. Many Tapatios complain that the sculpture is an eyesore with scant cultural value and an unfortunate resemblance to a certain fast-food chain emblem.
Fors is busy working on his five-ton work in his Guadalajara studio and expected to have it ready for installation before the end of 2017, or early next year at the latest.