To all Patriots in Seattle, check this out - 3526 Fremont Pl N, Seattle, WA 98103 The Statue of Lenin, Seattle, is a 16 ft (5 m) bronze statue of Communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, by Bulgarian sculptor Emil Venkov. It was completed and put on display in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic in 1988, the year before the Velvet Revolution of 1989. In 1993 the statue was bought by an American who had found it lying in a scrapyard. He brought it home to Washington state, but died before he could carry out his plans for displaying the Soviet era memento. Since 1995 the statue has been held in trust waiting for a buyer, standing on temporary display for the last 25 years on a prominent street corner in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle. It has become a Fremont landmark, and frequently has been decorated, or vandalized. The statue has sparked political controversy, including criticisms for being communist chic and as not taking the historic meaning of Lenin and communism seriously, or for taking it all too seriously, or by comparing the purported acceptance of such a charged political symbol to the removal of Confederate monuments and memorials. Much of the debate ignores the former monument's private, not public, ownership, and that it is installed on private property, with the public and the government having virtually no say in the matter.