Image of Indignation

Whether they like it or not, and they don’t, a 6-foot bronze sculpture of a naked woman with a missing breast has become a Rorschach test for residents of this small Central Coast community.

For weeks, controversy over a statue named “Garnet” has pitted neighbor against neighbor, merchant against merchant and the city seemingly against itself. Long used to living in the shadow of San Luis Obispo, its hipper and better-known neighbor to the north, Arroyo Grande is growing up--fast. It has the bruises to prove it.

“I would like to express my objections to the obscene object that has been put in place in the Arroyo Grande Village,” a breast cancer survivor wrote to the local Times Press Reporter newspaper. Even 12 years after her treatment, she said, she takes baths “with my eyes shut” and is horrified to confront the image of a “mutilated fertility goddess” when she goes shopping.

The statue, which weighs 1,500 pounds, has rounded, abstract flourishes that some have compared to ancient clay fertility symbols discovered in French caves. What some find so offensive is its location in a new plaza in the heart of the community’s small downtown.

Lined with some old shops that could serve as settings for a 1950s sitcom and others with a woody, coffeehouse pizazz, the area reflects the town’s changing personality as it absorbs growing numbers of refugees from the crowded realms to the north and south.

The collision of new and old attitudes is playing out in the debate over “Garnet” because the artist, Kate Britton, has defenders as well as detractors.

A Times Press Reporter cartoonist turned to the biblical tale of pearls before swine for inspiration when he sketched the sculpture surrounded by smirking pigs. “Are we forever doomed to portray only the safe, literal representation of the eternal horse or dolphin?” asked another admirer.

In the middle of all this sturm und drang, city officials are trying to walk a fine line between giving a sympathetic ear to outraged citizens and allowing free expression.

Sounding very much as if he wished it would all go away, City Manager Steve Adams called the statue “a very modern piece placed at the entrance to a historic village. It’s not that people don’t like it, but it doesn’t fit in with the theme.”

So what is the theme of the city? Some say Western history, pointing to the city’s seal, a stagecoach. Adams said it’s more like “turn of the century.”

Britton, 35, couldn’t agree more. The only question is, which century?

“Have they not seen art before?” she fumed. “In Los Angeles, New York or San Francisco nobody would have batted an eyelid.”

In a more reflective moment, though, she admitted that it was “probably put in the wrong place. Arroyo Grande considers itself a little Western town. Was it ready for this? Probably not.”

Britton said “Garnet” is a tribute to a friend stricken with breast cancer. Britton said she was particularly touched by her friend’s strength in the face of her successful battle against the disease.

“A lot of people she thought meant a lot disappeared [during her illness],” Britton said. “I was inspired by her. She was always there for her husband and kids.”

The opportunity to communicate her friend’s courage to a wider audience arrived when developer Joe De Lucia completed the new Village Centre plaza on Branch Street. De Lucia came up with the idea for a rotating art exhibit out front and chose the statue to be first.

Each exhibit is supposed to be on display six months, but almost immediately after “Garnet” was unveiled on Dec. 3, the situation, in Britton’s word, “exploded.” She was inundated with phone calls from the local media. Television cameras gathered in front of the statue. The Chamber of Commerce said phone calls were running 50 to 1 against “Garnet.”

While most said it’s nice enough, but it just doesn’t fit, some proclaimed it offensive and demanded its removal.

Over time, however, supporters came forward. A petition drive started to “give ‘Garnet’ a chance,” and an art class at San Luis Obispo High School wrote letters of support.

In the middle of the maelstrom, City Manager Adams paid a visit to De Lucia, a strong-willed, outspoken man who happened to like the statue just the way it was, and just where it was.

Out of that visit, Adams thought he received a promise to remove “Garnet” after three months, rather than six. Neville Chamberlain-like, he announced his compromise in the papers.

The problem was, De Lucia didn’t think he had made such a deal. And he didn’t like being pushed.

“Some people feel it should match the village,” he said, referring to the fact that the city calls itself the Village of Arroyo Grande. “It’s just a bunch of old buildings.”

Take that.

Now, De Lucia claims the city is trying to figure out another way to censor the exhibit. Adams admits there are discussions underway to create a policy on public art, but denied that it is aimed just at “Garnet.” “The issue has not been the piece itself, but the process,” he said.

De Lucia isn’t buying that one either. Community leaders, he said, “think their jobs are bigger than they are. They think this is a platform to become governor. They need to get a life.”

He’s so angry now, he said, that “I may not even take it down.”

As for Britton, who lives in San Luis Obispo, she said she is proud of what she has done. She’s also delighted by the reaction of other artists and critics, who have praised her work both for making people think and for its execution. The statue is for sale for $60,000.

Her response to the uproar ranges from anger to bemusement, depending on the moment. “What they’re really saying,” she said of her opponents, “is they want six months of rotating dolphins.”

But Britton also knows that there’s nothing like a little public outrage to give a struggling artist some recognition. “All artists go through controversy,” she said.

“My goal is to be in the big galleries in New York or Los Angeles,” she added. “If I get there sooner” and by way of a few letters to the editor, “all the better.”