Charging Bull
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Charging Bull (sometimes called the Wall Street Bull or the Bowling Green Bull) is a 3,200 kg (7,000 pound) bronze sculpture by Arturo Di Modica that sits in Bowling Green park near Wall Street in New York City.
The sculpture depicts a bull, the symbol of aggressive financial optimism and prosperity, leaning back on its haunches and with its head lowered as if ready to charge.
Di Modica reportedly created the sculpture following the 1987 stock market crash as a testament to his belief in the unceasing vitality of American capitalism. The sculpture, however, was not commissioned by the city as a work of public art. Rather, Di Modica created it on his own (at a personal cost of some $360,000) and installed it in December 1989 as "guerrilla art", trucking it to Lower Manhattan and placing it in front of the New York Stock Exchange as a Christmas gift to the people of New York .
The police seized the illegal sculpture and placed it into an impound lot. In response to the public outcry favoring the sculpture, the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation re-installed it several blocks away to its current location in the plaza at Bowling Green where it faces up Broadway.
The sculpture is one of the most photographed pieces of art in the city and has become a popular tourist destination for visitors to the Financial District. It has also come to be an unofficial symbol of the Financial District itself, and it often appears in the local news media to punctuate stories about optimism in the financial market.
In 2004, Di Modica announced that the bull sculpture was for sale, on condition the buyer does not move it from its present location.
Di Modica continues to own the copyright to the statue. In 2006, Di Modica sued Wal-Mart and other companies for illegally benefiting from his copyright, by selling replicas of the bull and using it in advertising campaigns.
