This past March, artist Michael Rakowitz revealed a monumental lamassu—a mythological creature with the body of a bull, the wings of a bird, and the head of a man—crafted from syrup cans. The piece, titled The Invisible Enemy Should Not Exist, proudly stands on London’s fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square. No permanent sculpture occupies this plinth, and it has become a prominent place for the city to display commissioned works of art temporarily. In the ancient Near East, lamassu served as guardian figures. Rakowitz’s piece commemorates a lamassu that stood at the gates to ancient Nineveh, capital of the […]
