Who beheaded the White Light Madonna?
That’s what they want to know at the Pence Art Gallery in downtown Davis, where someone smashed the head off the ceramic-and-tile sculpture in the gallery’s exterior courtyard sometime during the overnight hours of Thursday, Jan. 23.
Gallery director Natalie Nelson announced this week a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the unknown vandal or vandals, whose actions also are prompting the installation of security cameras in the courtyard area of the 212 D St. property.
“It’s just sad,” Nelson said of the damaged sculpture, created by regional artist Donna Billick, that has been on display at the Pence since 2014. “It feels very personal.”
Adding insult to injury is the possibility that the vandalism, difficult if not impossible to repair, may not be covered by insurance, Nelson added.
Police told gallery staff there were no other security cameras in the area that night that captured the incident, which occurred sometime after a class ended at the gallery at 10 p.m. Jan. 22 and 8 a.m. the next morning, when the assistant director arrived at work.
Nelson said that’s when she got a phone call informing her that “somebody decapitated the sculpture out here.”
“It looked like it had been hit with a baseball bat,” Nelson said of the damage, which broke the sculpture’s head into about two dozen pieces, scattering them across the courtyard. “They just went flying.”
The gallery has been the target of prior acts of vandalism — someone etched a swastika into a window several years ago, for example — “but never the art outside the building,” Nelson said.
Transient activity, including people sleeping outside the building and leaving human waste and drug paraphernalia behind, also has been an ongoing issue.
“We’re probably going to have to get a lock system on our bathrooms,” Nelson said. “It’s just sad. We want to be open to everybody, but things are changing.”
Meanwhile, Nelson and her colleagues are hoping the newly established reward will encourage witnesses to come forward. Anyone with information about this crime is asked to contact the Davis Police Department at 530-747-5400.
— Reach Lauren Keene at lkeene@davisenterprise.net or 530-747-8048. Follow her on Twitter at @laurenkeene