A new campaign wants you to stay away from a legendary statue.
Student Tilly Cripwell is trying to change one particularly obnoxious habit of tourists visiting Dublin: the groping of the famous Molly Malone statue.
Cripwell, a busker who spends hours next to the statue on Suffolk Street, watches tourists fondle the breasts of the bronze statue for good luck. The 22-year-old has launched the “Leave Molly mAlone” campaign to stop the practice. Cripwell questioned the misogynistic tradition, and questioned if groping the Statue of David would be considered appropriate. “If kids are seeing that it’s the norm, seeing it’s a tradition to grope a woman, how can we move on from the patriarchal history?,” she told The Independent.
The statue was sculpted in 1988 by artist Jeanne Rynhart to celebrate the millennium anniversary of the city of Dublin. It was moved from Grafton Street to its current location and it’s a popular tourist attraction. But the bronze is fading in places where people touch the lady to bring seven years of good luck, a practice encouraged by tourist guides.
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The Legend of Molly Malone
Myth or real, the statue represents a 17th-century woman, Molly Malone, who was a fishmonger and a working girl, nicknamed, “The Tart With a Cart.” She died of cholera and the tragic story is close to Dubliners hearts.
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Artist Jeanne Rynhart fashioned it in bronze, dressed her in a traditional outfit that highlighted her bosom (symbolizing a sex worker), and gave her a cart. The 19th century song “Cockles and Mussels” also pays tribute to the Sweet Molly Malone legend and it has become the unofficial anthem of the city. Dublin also celebrates Molly Malone Day on June 13.
She’s an important part of Irish folklore, but her artwork isn’t treated with respect. Locals who don’t agree with the tradition have been trying to prevent people from touching her, speaking about her hypersexualisation.
Over the years, it has been vandalized multiple times. In 2014, red paint was thrown on it after it was moved to its new location. Last August, “7 Years Bad Luck” was painted on her bosom to discourage tourists touching her breasts and Irish singer Imelda May gave her approval, saying that she has been protesting groping of the statue for years. Protestors also wrote “Please don’t, T.Y.” across her chest in green paint in September and again in November its base was painted with “Don’t Touch Me!” The city council cleaned her up; however, there were no plans to restrict access to the statue.
Statues With Similar Fates
Molly isn’t the only one that is tied to a good luck superstition.
Juliet’s 1972 statue in Verona, Italy, had to be removed in 2014 after love-seeking tourists damaged it. A replica of the teenager now stands in its place. Legend has it that touching Juliet’s breast will turn around one’s fortune in love, so the bronze statue garners inappropriate attention.
In France, a statue of a journalist in a cemetery is eroding. It is believed that the 1891 statue of Victor Noir boosts fertility, so tourists kiss the lips and touch the crotch of the reclining figure. This bronze statue has also become discolored over the years. In 2004, the French authorities built a fence around it but had to remove it after backlash.
People also get touchy-feely with the Charging Bull on Wall Street. Bizarre as it sounds, the nether region of this statue is supposed to bring luck, and people don’t hesitate from running their hands on its testicles in hopes of a change in fortune.
Cristiano Ronaldo’s statue in his town of Madeira, Portugal, is also subjected to groping, but without the promise of luck. The famous footballer’s sculpture was unveiled in 2014 and in the last decade, its groin area has been touched so often that it has gotten a shine.
It’s inconceivable that it has to be spelled out, but dear tourist, please keep your hands off statues even if your guides insist it’ll bring you luck.
Same thing happens with female figures on statues in Asia.
That is, statues on temples.
So it sounds like more of a problem with the tour guides than the tourists themselves.
We were in Dublin last year, and passed by the Molly Malone statue twice. Our tour guide did not suggest touching in any way, but you could see from the shiny spots that other people had no problems with touching. Perhaps if these statues were put on a pedestal, it would discourage touching the staues.