An artist is suing FIFA for $25 million for covering up his mural in downtown Dallas ahead of the World Cup.
Robert Wyland, a conservation artist who goes by Wyland, filed a 13-page federal suit in the Northern District of Texas on Monday claiming that FIFA and building managers violated the Visual Artists Rights Act by painting over the mural without telling him or getting his consent. Wyland painted the giant scene of whales in 1999 as part of an eventual series of 100 murals highlighting marine life in landlocked cities.
Last month, most of the mural was covered by solid blue paint. The president of the local World Cup organizing committee, Monica Paul, told The New York Times that the group’s goal was for “Dallas artists to participate, bring their energy, their passion, have a local impact in the arts space through the World Cup.”
Dallas is hosting nine matches in the World Cup, the most of any of the 16 tournament host cities. The matches will be at the Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium in Arlington, about 20 miles from downtown Dallas.
“In their zeal to capitalize on the international attention on Dallas during the FIFA World Cup, Defendants hastily and irrevocably destroyed a civic landmark,” the suit says. “Though FIFA claims they were working to develop art for the host city, in truth, they defaced an historic fixture of the host city.”
