NAXOS — A monumental sculpture carved from a single block of Naxian marble has left its quarry and begun a slow,carefully staged crossing of the island, headed first for the port and then for Switzerland.
The work, titled Lyra of Naxos,was created by sculptor Tobias Ballaty over more than six months at a quarry in Kinidaros. The finished piece measuresabout 12 metres long and six metres high and wide. Estimates of its weight range from 500 to 560 tonnes. It remains oneunbroken mass of stone.
Movement started on 29 September.
Because of the load, engineers are using a 12-axle self-propelled modular transporter and restricting travel to night hours so the island’s roads and villages are not blocked or damaged during the day.
The plan is to reach the port in time for a specialised vessel expected on Saturday. From there thesculpture will travel by sea to Basel.The original block was far larger — roughly 17 by 7 by 7 metres — before Ballatyreduced it to its present form. Local quarry officials have said the scale of a single-piece marble work of this size has already prompted contact with Guinness World Records.
Naxos has supplied marble for sculpture since antiquity.
The current operation is a modern counterpart to that tradition: a contemporary artist working the same stone, then moving the result with machinery that would have been unimaginable to the island’s ancient quarrymen.
For now the story is the road itself — a house-sized white lyre inching through the dark toward the sea.