France is sending one more Statue of Liberty to the United States in the hope of strengthening the friendship of the two countries.
The statue, known as the «little sister», is a much smaller version of the original, its height is only 10 feet, and its weight is 450 kg.
Despite the difference in height, the younger sister is considered an exact copy of the statue and was made using the original plaster model of 1878.
The statue was first made in 2009 and installed at the National Museum of Arts and Crafts (CNAM) in Paris in 2011, where it has remained since then.
However, on Monday, June 7, the younger sister was packed to go to the States. The statue will be installed on Ellis Island on July 1 and will stay there until July 5, CNN reports.
The younger sister will not stay in New York forever; the statue will eventually be installed near the residence of the French ambassador in Washington, DC, where she will stay for 10 years.
The Statue of Liberty was first installed in New York in 1886 and became a gift to the country from France. The French historian Andre Caspi noted that this gift was made at a time when the two countries were «slowly moving away from each other.»
The statue is full of symbolism: the seven spikes on its crown symbolize the sun’s rays spreading around the world, and on the tablet that it holds is written the date of America’s independence. The broken chains around her legs also symbolize the abolition of slavery in the United States.
