New York's Fearless Girl statue is all set to be auctioned. Why?

Standing opposite to the New York Stock Exchange is a 4-feet-tall bronze statue of a little girl, standing defiantly with her hands on her hips. The statue is known as the Fearless Girl.

The Fearless Girl statue was created by Kristen Visbal, and other than New York, the statue can be seen in London, Oslo and Melbourne too.

Originally erected in March 2017 and considered to be a unique symbol of women’s equality, Visbal is now all set to auction the New York statue under a three-day, sealed bid next week.

This announcement comes amid Visbal’s ongoing lawsuit since 2019 and the proceeds from the auction are believed to help Visbal cover her legal fees.

She is facing a breach of contract lawsuit the original commissioners of the Fearless Girl statue, State Street Global Advisors for copying her own work. The asset management firm claims that Visbal caused “substantial and irreparable harm” by selling copies of the Fearless Girl casts.

Visbal has created 25 full-sized bronze replicas of Fearless Girl statues and sold eight of them for US $250,000 each. Visbal also sold about 100 miniature versions of the statue for around US $6,000 each.

In response to the lawsuit, Visbal is currently selling NFTs of the Fearless Girl cast in different positions. The first Fearless Girl NFT collection, known as Interstellar Collection, is currently being sold on OpenSea, an NFT marketplace. The second collection, known as the Superstar Collection, will go on sale on May 31.

The Fearless Girl statue was originally placed in front of the iconic Wall Street bull (representing Wall Street and capitalism), created by Italian sculptor Arturo Di Modica. It was later relocated down the street after Di Modica complained that the Fearless Girl was an insult to his work.