Police and firefighters break into gallery after sculpture is mistaken for a person in distress

Police officers and firefighters recently broke into a Vancouver art gallery after an alarmed passerby mistook a sculpture for an intruder.

In what could be considered a marker of the sculpture’s success, someone walking past Access Gallery one night last month thought that a 2024 work by Allysa Pierre, Untitled [The Preparator], was a real person in in need of help.

Pierre’s work depicts an art handler kneeling over a crate with their upper body disappearing inside. The sculpture is featured in an ongoing group exhibition, Pending, (until 1 October).

According to a social media post by Access Gallery—located on East Georgia Street in Vancouver’s downtown eastside, where new galleries lured by cheap rent rub shoulders with a growing opioid crisis—the police and fire department broke into the gallery on the night of 14 August “for a rescue mission”. At around 11pm, Access Gallery’s director Saghi Ehteshamzadeh received a call from the Vancouver Police Department informing her that there had been an “emergency situation” at the gallery.

“First responders had been forced to enter the locked space, breaking the gallery’s lock in the process” after someone reported seeing a person inside who appeared to be in “medical distress”, according to the gallery’s post on Facebook. According to the Vancouver Police Department, a caller reported seeing a person’s feet sticking out from behind a counter and believed medical assistance was needed. When police could not reach the gallery, firefighters breached the door to gain entry.

Ehteshamzadeh told City News that when authorities eventually tracked her down, she was worried. “I was thinking I had locked the door and had the alarm on,” she said. “How could someone get in?”

When she learned that the fire department had forced entry, only for officers to discover that the person they had come to rescue was actually a sculpture, Ehteshamzadeh’s next question was: “Are you going to reimburse us for the lock?” The answer to that question is still pending. The gallery director was told that she could submit a claim to the city, but that reimbursement was not guaranteed.

The gallery procured a functioning lock once again thanks to a locksmith named Cameo, but were also left with a C$1,000 ($720) bill for his services. Ehteshamzadeh told City News that this expense could have been avoided if police had heeded the warning of a close friend of the Pierre’s, who lives across the street from the gallery and told them it was an artwork—featured prominently on the gallery’s website—ot a real person.

While Ehteshamzadeh awaits a decision from the city regarding her reimbursement claim, the gallery is fundraising for its 35th anniversary and inviting patrons to come see the Pierre’s work for themselves. And, from now on, Untitled [The Preparator] will be covered up at night to avoid any future incidents.