In January of this year, without any permission, artist Airco Caravan placed a statue of Martin Luther King in the park in the Rivierenbuurt named after him. The city district originally did not want to leave the statue, but today, six months later, the statue has been officially unveiled. And this by a very special guest.
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“When I put that statue there on the early morning of January 15, I didn’t expect that we would be meeting with such a nice group today to officially unveil the statue,” said Airco Caravan, the pseudonym of Maria Koning. And then also in this special era, in which the fight against racism is so topical. It seems like it should be like this. “
Former employee of King
But initially it didn’t seem like it would be so. Immediately after the image was placed, the Zuid district said to regret it that the statue was placed without consultation and against the agreements.
In early June, the city council replied to questions from SP councilor Tiers Bakker that the statue could still be left standing. “Partly because no negative signals have been received from society since the placement of the large bronze statue of Martin Luther King, the Zuid district has decided to leave the statue at its current location in the Martin Luther King Park for the time being.”
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With Bakker as one of the guests, the official unveiling of the bronze statue followed today. But the most special guest of all was the man who unveiled the artwork just after 4 p.m. Harcourt Klinefelter, 82, was a PR employee of King in the 1960s and has lived in the Netherlands for 47 years.
After revealing the image, Klinefelter gave a speech. “We are here today because of the corona virus. But we are together today. Because we have a dream, ”said Klinefelter, among others. A portion of the speech can be seen in the video at the top of this article.
Spoke in the context of the Keti Koti month AT5 a few weeks ago with Klinefelter about, among other things, the memories of King and the Black Lives Matter movement. The report can be viewed below.
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