MEMORIAL TO THE HIPPIE MOVEMENT

Since the summer of 2016, a bronze statue can be seen on the pedestrian promenade of the Marina de Ibiza, at the intersection of Carrer Lluis Tur i Palau and Carrer Guillem de Montgrí, installed here as a tribute to the hippie movement that animated the island in the 1960s and early 1970s. The Catalan sculptor Ció Abellí is the author: the work is a three-dimensional transposition of a famous image taken in 1972 in a park in Amsterdam by the photographer Toni Riera, depicting a long-haired father dressed as a hippie rascal exchanging a complicit gaze with his little daughter, who is similarly dressed. The artist chose this image because of the iconic dimension of the island it has come to occupy over the years. From the beginning of the hippie movement, many "peluts" ("hairy", as the islanders called these newcomers because of their generous hair) found in Ibiza a scent of the promised land, where the possibility of a libertarian society close to nature seemed accessible. Flower Power was in fact the watchword in the late 1960s and early 1970s in both Ibiza and Formentera. At the feet of the two figures is a world map showing the cities that were once high points of the movement: San Francisco, Amsterdam, Kathmandu, Goa and Ibiza. The work is a donation from the founder of the Pasha, Ricardo Urgell.