You might expect that the Charging Bull statue in New York, recognised worldwide as a symbol of Wall Street, was a specially commissioned piece of sculpture. I always thought it was funded by the New York Stock Exchange or the City of New York.
The real story is far more interesting.
The bull was designed and sculpted by local artist Arturo Di Modica to be a symbol of strength and hope following the stock market crash of 1987. He used $350,000 of his own money to fund this christmas gift to the city of New York.
Having completed the sculpture in December 1989, he got together a bunch of friends, a rented crane and a flat bed truck. The three and a half ton bronze statue was dropped off in a prime spot under the christmas tree outside the New York Stock Exchange at 1 am on December 15th 1989.
The NYSE were not best pleased with this major piece of guerrilla art. Demonstrating a complete sense of humour failure, the statue was moved, within hours, to a warehouse in Queens.
Happily for the bull and thanks to a newspaper campaign by the New York Post and the influence of a selection of the great and good of NYC, a permanent home was found at Bowling Green. The bull now appears in thousands of tourist photographs each year and is a mascot and talisman for the financial district and for the city of New York.
The Bull is not on Wall Street but is 2 minutes away from the NYSE at Bowling Green.
Please wait...