nobody seems to know who, what, when or why - see link - or those who do know have not come forward to explain it
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https://archive.ph/p2LNp
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Quote: TigerWuThis is similar to a bunch of others that have appeared over the last ten-ish years. At least one has been proven to have been made by some artist in California, and one or two others are strongly suspected to have been made by other artists.
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that would seem to be an awful lot of construction type work for an artist to do -
wouldn't it_________?
edit - actually, on 2nd thought from looking at the other links - they're not very tall - so it does seem like it is likely to be an artist's creation
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A few of my favorites, cribbed from the very loooooong Wiki. You can "find" what you want to "see." At least several of them are/were even edible. Bon apetit:
Quote:On 29 December 2020, a monolith appeared at Symphony Forest Park in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. One of the panels features etched numbers, relating to longitudes and latitudes of wildlife parks in India.[9] The anonymous artist said in an interview that "The monolith is shrouded in mystery around the world because people enjoy the mystery of unlocking new ideas and unlocking new thoughts. And this was my contribution to that engagement of thinking."[9] It disappeared on 13 January leaving a metallic sphere in its place.[10]
Quote:On December 10, 2020, a monolith was reported in a construction site in Zenata near Casablanca. Upon investigation, it was determined that the structure was installed by the chemicals and logistics company "Top Negoce" as part of a communication campaign for its new robot "Aya", made in partnership with a Silicon Valley company, and that the robot in question is reportedly trapped inside the structure.
Quote:On December 5, 2020, a monolith was discovered outside the town of Exireuil in the Deux-Sèvres Department. Local artisan welder Ludovic Liaigre later revealed himself to be the creator.[32]
Quote:On December 9, 2020, a 2.5 meter tall monolith was found in Le Havre, Normandy. It was later revealed to be an installation of Peppergraphik, a local company.[33]
Quote:On December 25, 2020, a "gingerbread monolith" appeared at Corona Heights Park in San Francisco. The structure was made of gingerbread with added frosting and gumdrops, and, although supported by plywood, collapsed the next day.[125][126]
Quote:On December 6, 2020, two separate monoliths were reported in Boulder. The first was found in Chatauqua Park, South Boulder. It quickly vanished and a second monolith was found outside of a taco restaurant in Boulder. The similarity and timing of the monoliths has led many to theorize that the same monolith was moved between the two sites.[128]
Quote:On December 9, 2020, a monolith was found in Toulouse, Haute-Garonne. It was revealed to be an installation of the Bricks festival's association a local music festival.[34]
Quote:On December 3, 2020, a monolith appeared in the area of Villa Sforza Cesarini, Lanuvio in the province of Rome. Unlike other monoliths, on both sides of the structure there is incomprehensible writing. On December 8, investigators identified the people behind the installation, a group of artists from Castelli Romani in the Metropolitan City of Rome. The artists have not been charged and the monolith remains in place.[48]
On December 6, 2020, a monolith was found in the town center of Ferrara. Its makers sent a note to local journalists claiming it was built by the X-Files character Fox Moulder [sic].[49]
Quote:On December 9, 2020, a steel monolith was discovered at Kadzielnia nature reserve in Kielce and has since been fenced off with tape due to a possible increase of radiation in the area.[58] On the same day, a second monolith was found by passing runners in Warsaw near the Świętokrzyski Bridge.[59] The city denied any involvement.[60]
Quote:On December 14, 2020, the satirical magazine ASZdziennik claimed to have constructed and placed the Warsaw monolith as a symbolic farewell to the year 2020.[61]
Quote:On January 7, 2021 a monolith was discovered in Edmonton, Alberta's Capital City. The local monolith is 3 meters tall, 125 kg and made of galvanized steel. The monolith was made by Brent Siermachesky, the general manager at Alberta Custom Metal Fabricators, who said "this is just a little something to make people chuckle when they drive by and say, 'Hey look, we got one of those in Edmonton now too.'"[98]
Quote:On December 13, 2020, a 3 meter tall monolith was discovered by a local resident who was driving around the farmland in Eureka Springs, in which it was located. Although of unknown origin, the monolith has undergone much speculation, as the land it currently resides on hosts an annual alien-themed music festival.
Quote:(...found on Pine Mountain in Atascadero, California...) On December 5, a group of four artists (Wade McKenzie, Travis Kenney, Randall Kenney and Jared Riddle) declared that they were the creators of the original structure, and after it was toppled, decided to replace it with a new one.[5] According to one of the artists, Wade McKenzie, "We intended for it to be a piece of guerrilla art. But when it was taken down in such a malicious manner, we decided we needed to replace it." The next day, the local deputy city manager, Terrie Banish, said that the city was "happy to see it return".[5]
Quote:On December 8, 2020, a monolith was reported in a parking lot at Scripps Ranch Marketplace, San Diego. It was hauled away that night by an unidentified group.[119][120]
Quote:On December 9, 2020, a monolith was found on the bank of Lake Tahoe on the CaliforniaNevada border.[122] It was later revealed to be a prank in which the monolith was installed, photographed, and removed in one day, then pictures were posted on social media.[123]
Quote:On December 4, 2020, a monolith appeared outside the Colorado Air and Space Port, northeast of Aurora. This monolith was not mysterious for long, however, as it was claimed by Bill Zempel, a mechanic at Mile High Aircraft Services.[127]
Quote:On December 3, 2020 a mini-monolith appeared in the center of Fayetteville. This monolith is similar in appearance to the others, but is only 1 meter tall. Later that day at 17:00, one of the public cameras showed one or several people in a white van which led to a local business called the Blashfield Sign company.[clarification needed] When owner Matt Blashfield was asked about involvement with the monolith, he denied having anything to do with it.[141]
Quote:In January 2021, a metal monolith appeared next to a trail by the banks of the Trinity River in Fort Worth. The mystery of its appearance was short-lived, however, as it was quickly revealed to be a stunt by local country music radio station KSCS with the help of high school students from nearby Millsap, Texas.[148]
Quote:On December 4, 2020, a monolith appeared in West Jordan, a suburb of Salt Lake City. This monolith did not remain mysterious for long, as it was claimed by a local steel manufacturer, Mountain Stainless Inc., as a marketing gimmick.[149]
Quote:In early December 2020, Australian comedy group Aunty Donna teamed up with the YouTubers behind the channel "I Did a Thing" and his friends erected a monolith on the outskirts of Melbourne, in an effort to promote their Netflix series Aunty Donna's Big Ol' House of Fun.[159]
Quote: DrawingDeadAmazing... that the disintigrating state of the New York Times is such that it does not have the ability or sufficient diligence to perform a simple image or topic search or even a glance at Wikipedia. Through which one would quickly discover that this has beein going on for years since the first stunt in 2016, and "going viral" (as the kids say nawadays) after 2020 with over 200 of them popping up worldwide as more navel gazing "artists" pranksters & assorted attention seekers, of both amateur & commercial advertising stunt variety, jumped on board to ride the eternally gullible internet/social-media feuled joke train.
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You clearly didn't read the article because they literally talk about some of the other monoliths that have popped up and artists taking credit for them.
Hilarious. In writing the NYT piece Mr. Diaz had time & space to become aware of the existence of four of the hundreds of "mysterious monoliths." Without hint of the rest that would tend to bring one further down to Earth. Even the local and national broadcast outlets that ran little pieces on this last week managed to provide A LOT more sensible context in the little stories thay aired - several days before the NYT, and most with an appropriate tongue-in-cheek tone of one who is in on the long-running joke.Quote: TigerWu[You clearly didn't read the article because they literally talk about some of the other monoliths that have popped up and artists taking credit for them.
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But fine, if you feel that was reasonable journalism, then you do. My favorite documentary on the subject - depending on what ya wanna think the "subject" is (filmed partly around Las Vegas & some nearby Mojave Desert areas over the river in AZ):
That, or else the cosmic aliens really like playing with the props in some of our movies when deciding how they wanna screw around with the hairy little earthlings. So much that they sent down a whole bunch of 'em that are so much like Stanley's. I might've prefered something with Sigourney Weaver, or a frisky Sigourney Droid suitable for plug & play use at home, but there's no accounting for alien taste, so here's the original, made in Hollywood:
Still my favorite ballcap:
Quote: DrawingDeadADDENDUM: It just dawned on me that some here, due to youth or whatever, might be unaware of where the whole "mysterious monolith" idea came from. Here it is, created by the film producer Stanley Kubrick in the 1968 movie, adapted from an earlier novel by the Brit science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. So the hundreds of assorted 'mystery monolith' themed artisy pranksters weren't bothering to be very creative and didn't even feel the need to try all that hard to get a wide-eyed reaction.
That, or else the cosmic aliens really like playing with the props in some of our movies when deciding how they wanna screw around with the hairy little earthlings. So much that they sent down a whole bunch of 'em that are so much like Stanley's. I might've prefered something with Sigourney Weaver, or a frisky Sigourney Droid suitable for plug & play use at home, but there's no accounting for alien taste, so here's the original, made in Hollywood:
Still my favorite ballcap:
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Glad you posted this. I was going to post the 2001 connection as I was reading this thread. The prologue chapter of the book re the aliens that left the monolith had a very large impact on my teenage brain.
About that... I had it wrong about the relationship between the book & the movie. It turns out the script & screenplay were written simultaneously, in a collaboration between Clarke & Kubrick, and the film's release actually preceded publication of the novel.Quote: unJonGlad you posted this. I was going to post the 2001 connection as I was reading this thread. The prologue chapter of the book re the aliens that left the monolith had a very large impact on my teenage brain.
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I think there's an unusually good Wiki on the movie, that goes into considerable depth on the "Meaning of the Monolith" begining with:
And I'm sure the maker(s) of that gingerbread, frosting, and gumdrops version of it that suddenly "appeared" in Corona Heights Park was deeply in-tune with every bit of that while creating his short-lived artistic & gastronomic masterpiece.Quote: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001:_A_Space_OdysseyFor some readers, Clarke's more straightforward novel based on the script is key to interpreting the film. The novel explicitly identifies the monolith as a tool created by an alien race who have been through many stages of evolution, moving from organic form to biomechanical, and finally achieving a state of pure energy. These aliens travel the cosmos assisting lesser species to take evolutionary steps. Conversely, film critic Penelope Houston wrote in 1971 that because the novel differs in many key aspects from the film, it perhaps should not be regarded as the skeleton key to unlock it.[199]
Multiple interpretations of the meaning of the monolith have been examined in the critical reception of the film
Carolyn Geduld writes that what "structurally unites all four episodes of the film" is the monolith, the film's largest and most unresolvable enigma...<SNIP>...
Personally, I think Derek Stevens is responsible for this one.
![](/images/user-images/DJTeddyBear/5619_large_circa_monolith.png)
Quote: DJTeddyBearThis photo was floating around the internet during the Covid lockdown.
Personally, I think Derek Stevens is responsible for this one.
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I understand his money originally was made in the auto parts manufacturing business. So, if someone wanted an order of cheese monolith to go, no fries with that & hold the ketchup...
Methinks there's a market for some kind of monolith tourism map & scorecard of sorts, revealing whether shiny or dark variety, which are accessible by public transport, availability of accomodations, RV hookups, WiFi & phone charging, if overnight camping is permitted for backpacking budget type non-alien monophilic creatures, and if edible, whether sweet or savory, vegan or gluten free...
Unfortunately, it seems that one was soon stolen. And I guess taken to wherever you go to fence a hot monolith in Pittsburgh.Quote: Reuters/Maranie StaabThis was publicity stunt to raise awareness about the importance of supporting small businesses who have all struggled tremendously this year," said Grandpa Joe's Candy Shop owner Christopher Beers. "I also wanted to add a little humor to the world news report."