6 FEBRUARY 27-MARCH 5, 2025 westword.com WESTWORD | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | NEWS | LETTERS | CONTENTS | Quit Horsing Around TEN THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BLUCIFER. BY PATRICIA CALHOUN From the moment “Mustang” reared its ugly, red-eyed head on the prairie, everyone became a critic. Some people loved Luis Jiménez’s piece; others loathed it. It quickly acquired nicknames — Blucifer, Blue Demon, Demon Horse — and an international reputation. But now, as DIA marks its thirtieth an- niversary, “Mustang” is as iconic as that tent roof — and perhaps even more emblematic of not just the airport, but the City of Denver. At a gathering in mid-February, seventeen years after the statue was installed thirteen years late, airport CEO Phil Washington concluded his remarks about the Great Hall’s anticipated construction project comple- tion with this: “Blucifer is going to stay out here as long as I do. I don’t want to be cursed.” With that settled, here are ten more things you need to know about Blucifer: 1. The 32-foot-high fiberglass horse’s offi cial name is “Mustang.” It was created by Luis Jiménez as a $300,000 commission in the fi rst round of public art approved for the then-still-in-the-works Denver Inter- national Airport in accordance with the city’s one-percent-for-art policy regarding construction budgets. 2. Despite its blue and orange (the light from those glowing eyes!) color scheme, the statue has absolutely noth- ing to do with the Denver Broncos. The artist, who was from New Mexico, was inspired by the wild mustangs that used to roam the Southwest. Some of the early sketches showed “Mustang” as yellow, even pink, but ultimately Jiménez went with blue. 3. Yes, “Mustang” actually killed its creator, solidifying its nickname of Blucifer. Like the airport that was to be graced by his statue, the artist missed the completion date. And then missed it again. After the air- port sued, the then-65-year-old artist got cracking. Jiménez was working on “Mustang” in his studio in 2006 when a piece of the statue cracked off, severing an artery in his leg. Jiménez bled to death, and his sons and studio fi nally fi nished the piece, which was installed on February 11, 2008 — more than fi fteen years after it was commissioned. By then, the cost had doubled to $650,000. 4. Initially, the plan was for a park to surround “Mustang,” with benches where art fans could sit and contemplate the work. Se- curity in the wake of 9/11 put the kibosh on that. 5. The inability to get up close and personal with “Mustang” might be just as well, since the horse pos- sesses a very graphic genital area, as The Colbert Report pointed out in a hilarious piece about all the phallic symbolism at Denver Inter- national Airport. 6. Less than a year after it was installed, there was a move to put Blucifer out to pasture. Local realtor Rachel Hultin created a Facebook page, “DIA’s Hei- nous Blue Mustang Has Got to Go,” that requested signatures demanding its banishment and asking for mean hai- kus, including this: Denver: true cow town/ A monstrous, evil blue horse/ It should be knocked down. The resulting mess made the front page of the Wall Street Journal, but “Mustang” stayed in place, because a piece of public art has a fi ve-year grace period before the city will consider removing it. 7. Blucifer made Travel + Lei- sure’s list of the “World’s Ugliest Public Art” in December 2011. “Be- tween unmanned check-in kiosks, overpriced sandwiches, and stress- ful security lines, the modern airport holds much that’s unpleasant, but to our knowledge only DIA makes you face down a 32-foot, darker-than- a-Smurf hell beast,” John Rambow wrote. “The rearing, 4.5-ton fi ber- glass horse seems poised to stomp on innocent travelers just trying to leave town. All joking aside, the statue really is a killer — its creator, Luis Jiménez, died when a section fell on him in his studio.” 8. Beyond the very true story about “Mustang” killing its creator, there’s another conspiracy theory involving “Mustang”: It looks very similar to the horse on the cover of The Montauk Project, a book about a government experiment during World War II that sent servicemen spiraling through the past and into the future. As the plot would have it, during one mission, U.S. troops landed in 2600, where they came upon a ruined city with the remains of a massive sculpture of a blue horse. (Think the end of Planet of the Apes, but with “Mustang” instead of the Statue of Liberty.) 9. The artist was sued over failing to deliver “Mustang,” but the artist’s estate has sued peo- ple, too. In late 2023, Abstract Denver received a letter from the Artists Rights Society, which represents the estate of Luis A. Jiménez Jr., claiming that assorted versions of Blucifer on T-shirts and stickers sold at its stores violated intellectual property rights. Although other attorneys would argue that depictions of Blu- cifer — including one in which the Blue Devil Horse fi ghts the Big Blue Bear — are fair use, given the fact that these are pieces of public art, Abstract Denver stopped printing the works rather than get involved in a long legal fi ght. “We’re celebrating it, not stealing it,” sighed Dave Roggeman, one of the company’s owners. “That’s the whole reason we started this busi- ness...we got tired of seeing the Colorado fl ag on everything. Denver is so much cooler than the Colorado fl ag. And ours are designed by Colorado artists and printed here in Colorado.” 10. A funny thing has happened in the years since “Mustang” was installed. It has become uniquely ours, a symbol of this city — like it or not. When the airport conducted a public art survey in the fall of 2011, prepara- tory to another big round of art commissions for another construction project, it found that “Mustang” was far and away the best-known piece of art at the airport. Although feelings were divided between those who loved it and those who loathed it, just about everyone surveyed had an opinion. And in inspiring that amount of thought alone, “Mustang” has done its job as a piece of public art. Email the author at [email protected]. NEWS KEEP UP ON DENVER NEWS AT WESTWORD.COM/NEWS The rear view of “Mustang” is a bit too graphic for some. Luis Jiménez’s estate didn’t appreciate this Blucifer art by Max Sherman. JARED JACANG-MAHER ABSTRACT DENVER
