by Alvaro Loureiro Oliveira
April 06, 2006
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Considered one of the wonders of the modern world, the Christ the Redeemer monument in Rio de Janeiro celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. However, there has long been some controversy over the work’s ownership as well as to whom royalties for its reproduction are due. The heirs of Heitor da Silva Costa have now unveiled important documents shedding light on the facts and putting an end to discussions about who has rights to the work.
The statue’s history began in 1921 when, as the 100th anniversary of Brazil’s independence approached, the Catholic Circle of Rio de Janeiro initiated a viability study for the construction of a monument in honour of Christ the Redeemer.
Numerous designs were submitted to an examining board, which selected the contribution of the Brazilian architect and engineer Silva Costa. Although the original design was somewhat different, Silva Costa’s studies culminated in the symbolic representation of the Christ figure with arms outstretched to suggest a cross.
Based on the studies and sketches, and with important collaboration from the Brazilian drawer and painter Carlos Oswald, Silva Costa prepared two scale models. He then traveled to Europe, where an engineering firm assisted in calculating the monument’s structural requirements and a statue maker was engaged to refine plans for building the monument.
In France, Silva Costa commissioned Paul Landowski, a sculptor whose work he admired and identified as consistent with his vision for the monument. Duly compensated for his work, Landowski helped Silva Costa build one to four-metre scale models, essential to the transposition of the final, 30-metre statue. Landowski was also responsible for the plaster mould of the face and hands of the Christ image.
This collaboration, however, led to uncertainty as to who held the rights for the statue of Christ the Redeemer. An architect-engineer conceived, executed and made the work; a painter was responsible for the sketches; and a sculptor built the scale models. Ownership rights, then, belong to the three artists. However, under the project’s contract, the statue’s ownership rights were permanently assigned to the commissioning party, the Civil Society Christ the Redeemer Monument Commission, now incorporated by the Archdiocese of Rio de Janeiro. It, then, is responsible for managing these rights, and consequently for any royalties due for use or reproduction of the monument.
The location of the document signed by Silva Costa and the others is unknown, but the contract clearly stipulates the yielding of these rights as a condition for Silva Costa’s completion of the project. Since he did in fact complete the work, the conclusion is obvious, and the writings of Landowski support this deduction: they formally record his yielding of ownership rights related to his participation in the work, at the request of Silva Costa.
Thus, the heirs of Silva Costa, Oswald and Landowski hold moral rights in the statue and should fight for recognition of their forebears’ collaboration, demanding that the respective names be cited wherever authorship is credited and preventing any substantial changes to the monument. The timing could not be better for setting the record straight: celebrations of the monument’s 75th anniversary are the ideal moment for sealing the creators’ names in the national and international memory.