The first Melania Trump statue in her native Slovenia was destroyed by fire and now its bronze replacement has gone missing, prompting a police investigation.
The life-sized bronze statue of the US first lady was unveiled near her hometown of Sevnica in 2020, towering over a field on a tree stump, after arson had destroyed the previous wooden one.
“The theft was reported on 13 May and immediately police officers visited the crime scene and launched an investigation,” Alenka Drenik Rangus, a spokesperson for the police, said on Thursday.
According to police and the bronze’s creator, the American conceptual artist Brad Downey, the statue was chopped off at the ankles and removed.
Downey said he learned about the theft while preparing a new project in Germany and said he was “a bit sad that it’s gone”.
“My feeling is that it has something to do with the new election [of Donald Trump], but who knows, right?” Downey told AFP.
He added that when the original statue had been set on fire “it didn’t feel right” so he had decided to replace it with a bronze copy, which he has described as an “anti-monument, anti-propaganda”.
The original statue, which featured the US first lady in a blue dress and heels, had been carved with a chainsaw by Ales Zupevc, a local artist, out of a tree.
The bronze statue was placed in a private field – fixed with concrete and metal bars – near Sevnica toward the end of Donald Trump’s first presidential term, while he was campaigning for re-election.
Melania Trump’s arrival in the White House when her husband became the US president raised hopes he may one day visit her homeland, which has yet to happen.
The first lady has inspired numerous products in Sevnica, which is 90 kilometres (60 miles) east of the capital Ljubljana, to be named after her, including cakes and chocolates.
