Coney Island’s cyclops is going sightseeing.
The cyclops, a 1950s “folk art icon,” is leaving Brooklyn for the first time to take part in a traveling exhibition about Coney Island.
To celebrate, fans are throwing a bon voyage party for the sculpture on Sunday complete with “ghoulade” and eyeball cookies.
The 5-foot-tall sculpture of a cyclops head, made from bandages and plaster by unknown artisans, sat on the roof of the legendary Spook-A-Rama ride beginning in 1955, frightening visitors with its ghastly horn and evil grin. During the night, his mechanical one eye — which moves from side to side — would glow red. It was retired in 1987.
The Coney Island History Project’s director, Charles Denson, helped rescue the cyclops from storage in 2011 while doing research for the upcoming exhibit.
“The sculpture is unique, one-of-a-kind, a throwback to the hand-made craftsmanship and creativity that made Coney the center of the amusement universe,” he said, in a statement.
“Cy” as he’s known, will travel with the exhibit “Coney Island: Visions of an American Dreamland,” being organized by the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum in Connecticut. The show opens in January 2015.
