EVERY JANUARY, and this one’s no exception, witnesses a ritual of defacing or bringing down of statues of James Cook in Australia in well-planned interventions by those who protest against linking Australia Day to his arrival on the continent in January 1788 and the genocide of native people that followed. 

Nearly 20 years earlier, in 2006, British artist Hew Locke mercilessly ridiculed slaver Edward Colston by adorning his statue in Bristol with glittering, ersatz-gold regalia and trinkets as part of his Restoration series.

Locke’s intention to expose Colston’s involvement in corruption and enrichment through slavery was abundantly clear but, at the time, the message remained largely within the realm of contemporary art.