Viger Square makeover infuriates Charles Daudelin's family

The family ofQuebec sculptor Charles Daudelin is upset after the city announced plans to destroy the artist's Agora installation in Viger Square.

TheDaudelinfamily's lawyer said the artist's family members havealways refused to give their consent for the city to dismantleAgora, and they aren't giving it this time either.

Agora is a series of concrete structures in Viger Square, designed by the late Daudelin in the late 1970s and early 1980s.Daudelindied in 2001.

Its beams and platforms were meant to be adorned with hanging plantsto mimic the gardens of Greek antiquity;its open spaces, designed for public gatherings and street performers.

Instead, it has become a home to Montreal's homeless, and the elements and vandalism have turned it into an eyesore.

Dinu Bumbaru of Heritage Montreal said the city never helped it live up to its potential and now, he said, the city is taking the wrong approach by deciding to tear it down.

"Instead of having that veryinsignificant as far as I can say from the drawing we've seen design that the administration is proposing, having a competition and having the youth of Montreal, the creative youth to the service of that space might be a better idea. Now, having a consultation, two weeks after the decision has been made, what's the point?" he said.

"Maybe it's a bit more responsible to send creative landscape architects like the one that just restored DorchesterSquare into a wonderful place, than to send in a bulldozer," Bumbaru continued.

City of Montreal's vision for a new Viger Square

9 years ago

Duration 1:07

Viger Square makeover will see the destruction of Quebec sculptor Charles Daudelin's Agora.

Deal or no deal, it's coming down: City

Mayor Denis Coderre saidthe city does plan to keep part of Agora:the Mastodo fountain.

"We have a duty of memory. Maybe it didn't work well, but still we have to celebrate the artist," Coderre said.

Bumbaru saidintellectual property rights couldstopthe city from altering the work.

However,Coderre said evenif the city can't reach an agreement with the Daudelin family, it will go ahead with scrapping Agora fountain and all.

"We had to do it," Coderre said. "We wish there was an agreement, but if there is no agreement it's going to be very sad for me and for them because we want to celebrate [Daudelin]."

The renovation of Viger Square, which is expected to be completed in time for Montreal's 375th anniversary, will cost $28 million. The work is expected to begin in the fall.