This is the fourth in a series of hilarious sculptural hoaxes that the Staten Island sculptor takes over to Battery Park to trick tourists (and some locals, no doubt). The first was a monument to a giant octopus that attacked the Staten Island Ferry (gone unnoticed because it happened on the same day as the JFK assassination). A year later was a monument to an elephant stampede on the Brooklyn Bridge. Then a UFO abduction of a tugboat during the Blackout of 1977.
The article says it's a prank.
> This is the fourth in a series of hilarious sculptural hoaxes that the Staten Island sculptor takes over to Battery Park to trick tourists (and some locals, no doubt). The first was a monument to a giant octopus that attacked the Staten Island Ferry (gone unnoticed because it happened on the same day as the JFK assassination). A year later was a monument to an elephant stampede on the Brooklyn Bridge. Then a UFO abduction of a tugboat during the Blackout of 1977.
The article says it's a prank.