Malaga council agrees to remove 15 Invader mosaics while vandals attack others

The works by the French artist on buildings in the old city centre will be removed at the request of the Junta de Andalucía

A. J. LÓPEZ / F. GRIÑÁN

Friday, 16 June 2017, 17:21

The days are numbered for some of the mosaics the anonymous French street-artist Invader gifted the city of the Malaga last month.

At the end of last week the city hall agreed to remove 15 of the 29 illegal works that appeared on walls around the city as an unannounced prelude to the artists planned exhibition in the city in September.

The 15 mosaics, in the artists style reflecting space invader games of the eighties, are all in the historic part of the city, protected as a whole as a BIC (asset of cultural interest). A complaint about one of them, a flamenco dancer on the Palacio Episcopal building, owned by the Diocese of Malaga, sparked the investigation by the Junta de Andalucías Culture department.

However this week, another mosaic, this one near La Malagueta beach and not included in the 15 to be removed, has been ripped off the wall the artist had stuck it to. The piece in question, a red space invader with a blue background, is likely to have broken. To avoid the theft of his works, the artist uses a strong adhesive that not only makes their removal difficult but means it is highly likely that forceful removal would cause them to break.

Further damage, this time graffiti, has been caused to two more pieces in the area, which appeared on Monday with the words bit and amo written across them.

Meanwhile the representative of the Junta de Andalucías Culture department in Malaga, Monsalud Bautista has said that city hall can remove 13 of the 15 mosaics, while extra authorisation was required for the work to be carried out on the two buildings declared as BICs themselves, the Palacio Episcopal, next to the Cathedral, and the Palacio de Salinas.

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