Model version of Queen Shamiram statue, as presented to Arts Commission. Photo: Bianca Davoodian
Queen Shamiram Site Selected: Turlock City Hall by Alex Cantatore. Turlock City News, August 27, 2013.
After months of work, a City of Turlock subcommittee has located a site for a donated statue of Queen Shamiram, the first female ruler of the Neo Assyrian Empire.
On Thursday, the Turlock City Arts Commission unanimously accepted a recommendation to site the statue at Turlock City Hall. The nine-foot tall bronze statue depicting Shamiram, valued at $250,000, will be displayed on Broadway near the engineering department, in an alcove in front of a balcony.
The location was recommended by an ad-hoc committee, but was ultimately chosen by the statue's donor Narsai David, a chef, radio, and television personality, originally of Turlock.
David donated the statue to the City of Turlock in January, after California State University, Stanislaus declined the piece. The college said the artwork did not fit into the university's public art plan.
An ad-hoc subcommittee, comprised of Turlock City Arts Commissioners and Turlock Parks, Recreation, and Community Programs Commissioners, then drafted several lists of acceptable sites, all of which were rejected by David for various reasons. Throughout the process, CSU Stanislaus remained David and the local Assyrian-American community's preferred site.
In April the college said it might, eventually, allow the statue to be sited there, but that a decision would take at least two years. At the same time, the subcommittee recommended two city-owned sites: the Turlock Senior Center, located at 1191 Cahill Ave., and the Carnegie Arts Center, located at 250 N. Broadway.
No word was heard from the subcommittee until Thursday, when the City Hall location came to light and earned the support of the Turlock City Arts Commission.
The City Hall location is not yet final. The Turlock City Arts Commission will hold a public hearing to discuss the site in the coming months, after David completes some paperwork. That recommendation will then go to the Turlock City Council for final approval.
If approved, David will pay for all installation costs. There is no firm time frame as to when that installation would occur.
The Arts Commission's suggested location at City Hall for the Queen Shamiram statue.
Assyria
\ã-'sir-é-ä\ n (1998)
1: an ancient empire of Ashur
2: a democratic state in Bet-Nahren, Assyria (northern
Iraq, northwestern Iran, southeastern Turkey and eastern Syria.)
3:
a democratic state that fosters the social and political rights to all of
its inhabitants irrespective of their religion, race, or gender
4: a democratic state that believes in the freedom of
religion, conscience, language, education and culture in faithfulness to the
principles of the United Nations Charter —
Atour synonym
Ethnicity, Religion, Language
»
Israeli, Jewish, Hebrew
»
Assyrian, Christian, Aramaic
»
Saudi Arabian, Muslim, Arabic
Assyrian
\ã-'sir-é-an\ adj or n (1998)
1: descendants of the ancient empire of Ashur
2: the Assyrians, although representing but one single
nation as the direct heirs of the ancient Assyrian Empire, are now
doctrinally divided, inter sese, into five principle
ecclesiastically designated religious sects with their corresponding
hierarchies and distinct church governments, namely, Church of the
East, Chaldean, Maronite, Syriac Orthodox and Syriac Catholic.
These formal divisions had their origin in the 5th century of the
Christian Era. No one can coherently understand the Assyrians
as a whole until he can distinguish that which is religion or church
from that which is nation -- a matter which is particularly
difficult for the people from the western world to understand; for
in the East, by force of circumstances beyond their control,
religion has been made, from time immemorial, virtually into a
criterion of nationality.
3:
the Assyrians have been referred to as Aramaean, Aramaye, Ashuraya,
Ashureen, Ashuri, Ashuroyo, Assyrio-Chaldean, Aturaya, Chaldean,
Chaldo, ChaldoAssyrian, ChaldoAssyrio, Jacobite, Kaldany, Kaldu,
Kasdu, Malabar, Maronite, Maronaya, Nestorian, Nestornaye, Oromoye,
Suraya, Syriac, Syrian, Syriani, Suryoye, Suryoyo and Telkeffee. —
Assyrianism verb
Aramaic
\ar-é-'máik\
n (1998)
1: a Semitic language which became the lingua franca of
the Middle East during the ancient Assyrian empire.
2: has been referred to as Neo-Aramaic, Neo-Syriac, Classical
Syriac, Syriac, Suryoyo, Swadaya and Turoyo.
