Destruction of artwork becoming a campus problem

Megan Kinney, a senior sculpture major, spent countless hours and hundreds of dollars building and installing her most recent sculpture on campus. Until recently, the 11-foot tall structure, which consisted of a wooden frame and steel chairs, stood proudly on East Third Street near the Optometry Building.\nBut, it was there for merely two weeks before it was torn down. Now the pieces lay scattered around the spot where it once stood. \nGraham Szybala, another senior sculpture student, experienced the destruction of one of his pieces this semester as well. His sculpture, located near the Student Building, was interactive and consisted of moving, hanging mirrors which displaced surrounding images. Twice this semester, mirrors were stolen from the structure.\nSzybala's sculpture was a visual experience for people on campus to take part it. "It was there for people to enjoy," Szybala said.\nBut it looks like some people did not realize the value of both his and Kinney's work.\nDale Newkirk, a sculpture professor for who's class Kinney and Szybala created the sculptures, says that art destruction is a growing problem on campus. In addition to the two incidents this semester, there was also one this summer. \n"I've been teaching this class for a long time -- five years," Newkirk said. "There's been a rise of this kind of activity. People don't realize the work that students put into this."\n"I've been working on this since the first week of school," Kinney said. For Kinney, it was a long and difficult process involving research, getting approval from the University to use the site, obtaining materials, building and re-building the structure, and then finally installing it. \n"Money is the biggest thing," Szybala said. "It's (upsetting) to see that you pay that money and then it gets messed up."\nEveryone agreed that ignorance was the biggest thing that caused the destruction. \n"It seems to be just ignorance on the part of people who were doing it," Kinney said. "This is not a sign for a building on campus. Unlike a street sign, this is something that is hard to replace. It's very hard to fix, and sometimes financially it cannot be done."\n"There are a lot of stupid people out there," Szybala said. \n"It's an act of just not thinking about what they're doing," Newkirk said. "It's a lack of respect."\nNewkirk says that if this trend continues, he will start encouraging students to install their work off-campus instead. \n"It's also becoming more difficult to get approval for spaces on campus," Newkirk said. "The city has been more open to finding places for student artwork. We haven't had anything damaged off campus (such as) near parks and schools and near Kirkwood"