Artists want NYPD to return confiscated Edward Snowden bust

NEW YORK, April 14 (UPI) -- A group of guerrilla artists who placed a bust of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden atop a column in a New York park only to have police confiscate it are demanding for the sculpture to be returned.

The 4-foot, 100-pound bust of Snowden was placed atop a column that is part of the Prison Ship Martyrs Monument in Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn on April 6. The name "Snowden" was also attacked in large typeface at the base of the column.

The New York Police Department removed the statue a mere hours later and said they are keeping it as part of the investigation into the incident.

The anonymous artists now say they want the sculpture back so they can put it on display through all the proper channels.

NYC Parks Advocates President Geoffrey Croft told 1010 WINS in New York the artists want to apply to have the sculpture put on display through the city's "Art in the Parks" program.

" 'Art in Parks' has been a long, long, long held tradition and having the city seize a work like this simply just doesn't make sense," Croft said. "We feel it's censorship and it sends the wrong message."

But it can take months for the application to be approved, so a local gallery in Manhattan has agreed to show the work in the meantime.

Croft, along with attorney Ron Kuby, sent a letter to the NYPD asking for the bust to be released.

"The letter basically states that they don't have a right to legally seize the artists' property and they are demanding that the bust be returned immediately," Croft said.

"Whatever the right of the Parks Department to remove an unauthorized park sculpture," Kuby said during a news conference Tuesday, "that does not translate into the right of the police to indefinitely detain a work of art."

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Artists want NYPD to return confiscated Edward Snowden bust