A statue of a UK Black Lives Matter protester was removed on Thursday, just a day after it replaced a monument to 17th-century slave trader Edward Colston.
The video shows helmets in Bristol carefully removing the statue of protester Jen Reid with her fist in the air around 5:20 am, The Guardian reported.
The piece of steel and black resin, titled “A Surge of Power (Jen Reid) 2020”, was erected on Wednesday morning by London sculptor Marc Quinn.
It replaced a statue of Colston, which was downed last month and dumped into the Avon River.
Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees said the city was going through an “incredibly delicate time.”
“It is not about knocking down a statue of Jen, who is a very impressive woman,” Rees told BBC Radio 5 Live. “It is about tearing down a statue of a London-based artist who came and placed it without permission.”
Reid was photographed on June 7 on the plinth that held the Colston statue for 125 years.
“When I stood there on the socket and raised my arm in a Black Power salute, it was totally spontaneous,” he told the BBC. “I didn’t even think about it. It was as if an electrical charge of energy was going through me. ”
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