First Steve Jobs Statue Unveiled

BUDAPEST, Hungary – The rumored statue of late Apple C.E.O. and famed technological innovator Steve Jobs was unveiled today in a Budapest science park, two months after his death.

Though many memorials have been fashioned and presented in the wake of Jobs’ death on October 5, this is the first statue. The larger-than-life piece stands at two meters, depicting Jobs wearing his trademark jeans and turtleneck, holding onto what appears to be an iPhone, with one hand raised.

Gabor Bojar, the founder of software company GRAPHISOFT is the man (or rather the wallet) behind the six-and-a-half-foot bronze statue sculpted by Hungarian artist Erno Toth. Of the late-great technological monolith, Gabor said:

“He was one of the greatest (personalities) in our era, that’s what we wanted to express with this sculpture here. … In some ways, Apple was a religion. We have felt his spirit every day and now it is embodied. We hope that we can deserve with our entrepreneurial culture in Hungary what this sculpture expresses as a message.”

Doting on Jobs further, Gabor has said that, “Steve Jobs made technology available to the masses first over the desktop, then in our pockets,” and that Jobs “was the creator of technology with a human face.” Gabor also considers Jobs as a “mentor of sorts.”

The science park in which the statue stands is home to several technology companies including Gabor’s GRAPHISOFT which has been supported by Jobs who stumbled across it at a CEBIT international trade fair in Germany in 1984.

I feel mass pilgrimages coming on. Like photographs in the Chicago Bean or ones of tourists straining to hold up the Leaning Tower of Piza, more pictures of people snapping a photo of the statue with their iPhones and iPads are certainly on their way, says I.

What do you think of all this statue business? Is that thing horrifying or inspiring?