Marianne de Tolentino writes in Hoy newspaper that Dominicans were not able to defend the gift of one of the most impressive demonstrations of public art ever in the Caribbean and Latin America, and now must ponder their loss. In 1994, top Venezuelan artist Carlos Cruz-Diez bestowed Dominicans with the geometrically eye-pleasing painting of the 28 silos (11,200 square meters) of the Molinos Dominicanos, a Dominican flour mill. The journalist comments that when the mill was privatized, the contract did not make any stipulation regarding the preservation of the silos’ artwork. After the mill’s privatization and sale to a Dominican group, and eventual re-sale to a Guatemalan group, the new owners decided it was time for a white-washing of the silos. Hoy newspaper laments that this gift of visual imagery to the colonial city and eastern part of Santo Domingo is now gone. Maestro Cruz Diez had left instructions that called for retouches to the silos to be made every two years to maintain the vitality of his work. This, however, was never carried out, and now, before the 10th anniversary of the work of art, the painting is no more. The newspaper shares with Dominicans the words of then-Venezuelan Ambassdor Maria Clemencia Lopez Jimenez in July 1994: “I believe this is the most important work we have ever carried out?. First, because of the artistic category of Cruz Diez and for the magnitude of the work, and because it will be a new experience for the Dominican people. I am sure the people will know how to appreciate it. And may it lead to a chain of productive public art works.”