It all started in 2016 with a bronze statue commemorating the tragic day in November 1963 when a giant octopus upended the Staten Island ferry, killing nearly 400 people in New York. The three memorials to three made-up tragedies sprung from the vivid imagination of Reginella, a 47-year-old sculptor and jokester who has made an art out of monuments commemorating non-existent victims. He makes the bronze sculptures in his spare time, in the basement of his Staten Island home. The tugboat crew “vanished” on the night of July 13, 1977, when a huge blackout plunged New York into darkness. A curious observer can type “octopus” and “Staten Island ferry” into YouTube and find a black-and-white documentary featuring archival footage of putative wreckage, along with witnesses and experts talking about the disaster.

Source: Egypt Independent December 24, 2018 13:30 UTC