Monument to Indigenous Women Will Replace Columbus Statue in Mexico City

A pedestal in the center of Mexico City that once hosted a statue of Christopher Columbus has stood empty since last October. Now, reports Johnny Diaz for the New York Times, a sculpture of an Indigenous woman is set to replace the controversial explorer’s likeness.

Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum announced plans for the new statue last Sunday, on Mexico’s Day of the Indigenous Woman.

Designed by Mexican sculptor Pedro Reyes, the soon-to-be installed statue is titled Tlalli—the Nahuatl word for water. It depicts a woman from the Olmec civilization, which inhabited present-day Mexico between roughly 1400 and 400 B.C.E., as Taylor Dafoe writes for Artnet News. The first major civilization in Mexico, the Olmec are best known today for their massive sculptures of human heads.

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