Philly police seek suspects who allegedly cut wire from Portal in LOVE Park
Surveillance cameras caught a person cutting a wire from the video art installation on Feb. 1, police said.
Philadelphia police are searching for a group of vandals who they say cut and removed a section of copper wire from the Portal installation in LOVE Park last month.
The incident occurred about 5:40 a.m. on Feb. 1, when surveillance cameras caught a person cutting a wire from the video art installation, police said. The vandal then left the area with three other people, and the wire that was removed from the Portal was placed in a large green-and-yellow trash can.
The suspects were also captured on footage from subway surveillance cameras, which police released via their YouTube channel.
Police did not indicate whether the alleged theft of the wire caused downtime for the Portal, or if repairs were required. A representative for the Portals Organization did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Portal, however, has been offline in recent days. Last week, the Portals Organization said that the installation was down for routine maintenance and upgrades and that it would be operational again early this month.
“We’re thrilled to be able to continue bringing people together across the globe through the Portal,” Portals Organization director Joseph Callahan said in a statement last week. Callahan added that the group planned to hold a number of St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in conjunction with the attraction’s return.
It is unclear when that work began, but the Portal was down and wrapped in a blue tarp ahead of the Super Bowl, a little more than a week after the alleged wire theft.
The Portal arrived in Philadelphia in late October and went online with a crack in its screen that it had incurred amid its travel to the city from New York, The Inquirer reported at the time. The massive screen connects Philly to other screens in Dublin, Ireland; Vilnius, Lithuania; and Lublin, Poland.
At the opening of the Philly portal, Lithuanian artist and Portals project creator Benediktas Gylys called it “an honor” to have his work represented in the city.
“We hope a Portal will find a permanent home in the birthplace of America,” he said.
Police asked that anyone with information regarding the wire theft contact the Central Detective Division at 215-686-3093/3094 or submit a tip anonymously online.