Carole Feuerman's Survival of Serena is a haunting, vivid sculpture of a woman clinging for dear life to an inner tube.

But the artwork, which has been exhibited in China and Venice, did not survive a trip to Miami.

The sculpture was crushed on its way from Venice to Miami International Airport, deprived of its display at Art Miami, which begins Tuesday.

''It's almost fate,'' said Feuerman.

Its imagery is meant to represent the survival of Venice, a city that has seen its worst flooding in 20 years.

Made of oil-painted fiberglass and resin, the 4-by-12-foot piece has a value of $300,000, Feuerman claims. Feuerman spent three years working on the piece, adding carefully detailed water droplets made of epoxy on the woman's painted skin before completing it in 2006.

''I've never seen any [artwork] totally destroyed like that,'' said Aaron Giller, one of two deliverymen sent by the art handling company to pick up the piece at MIA.

The Miami-based insurance adjuster, who represents the artist's insurer, is responsible for finding who -- or what -- destroyed Serena.

Continental Airlines, which transported the piece, declined comment Monday.

Join the discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.repliedToText@

@Nyx.replyAnswerText@

Reply to this Comment @Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@