The Three-Horned Devil: Why a raunchy statue of Satan was built in Canada
Picture the scene. You’re a humble citizen of Vancouver, Canada, in 2014. Every day, you take the Grandview Highway to work. It’s as pleasant as a drive to work can be, one that you know like the back of your hand until suddenly, you see something (something that’s supposed to be a work of art) that nearly makes you crash.
It’s a new addition to the surroundings, and while that would normally be cause for celebration, not this time, because this is, quite simply, a disgusting affront to everything you hold dear… It’s an eight-foot-tall, scarlet statue of Satan himself – glowing yellow eyes, tomato red skin, two horns on his head, adding at least another foot to his height and a bulbous, girthy tail reaching through his legs in an utterly vulgar simulation of… Oh boy, that is not a tail.
Yes, believe it or not, the first thing you’ll notice on this statue of Beelzebub is not the horns or the eyes or his cloven hoofs or the devil horns he’s throwing up with his right hand. It’s the enormous, foot-long erection he’s sporting, reaching to the heavens, probably in an attempt to mock the Good Lord himself – this would be a bit graphic for most heavy metal shows, so what on earth was it doing on a nondescript part of suburban Vancouver?!
Well, that’s just it. We genuinely didn’t know for sure. No one in Canada claimed responsibility for it until five full years after its appearance and subsequent, very quick removal. Even then, all we have to go on is their word for it. Considering that all they were able to say about their identity was that they went under the name “Obsidian”… well, we should all know better than to take the devil at his word.
God, I hope the rest of his name was ‘Blackbird McNight’.
What was this devil statue in Canada all about then?
“Obsidian” supposedly broke his silence to the Vancouver Courier, saying that he’d worked on the (if you’ll pardon the expression) piece for three months. He provided the Courier with photographic evidence of it, half-finished in his kitchen, so there is a chance he’s being legit with us. He went on to explain that there was a plaza close to his house that had housed a small statue of Christopher Columbus. One that had since been (rightfully) taken down.
Thus, this plaza was unused, and the pedestal in the centre of it was completely vacant. After completing the statue of the most shocking thing he could think of, he and three friends successfully installed it. Not without incident, you understand. Obsidian remarked to the Courier that the pedestal was higher than he thought, and his motley crew nearly dropped it. They were working in the dead of night after all. Fortunately, they managed to set it up, and despite the statue getting immediate backlash, the strangest thing happened afterwards.
The population of Vancouver loved it. When it was removed by the city council, a petition was started to reinstate it, which got thousands of signatures. When the creator couldn’t be located, another petition was started for the city to formally adopt it, which also got thousands of signatures. None of this was enough to save Satan, however, and into the trash he went. However, eventually, more and more versions of the same statue began to pop up over the course of the next few years
Obsidian took credit for these as well, because after all, you can’t keep a good devil down.