A CONTROVERSIAL statue in Southend has been secured in a UK database of publicly owned sculptures.

A bronze statue called Leda and the Swan has been digitised in an online database by the charity Art UK, joining thousands of other sculptures from across the country that are owned by the public.

The statue is a depiction of Greek mythology, in which the god Zeus, in the form of a swan, rapes the mortal woman Leda.

It was first commissioned by Southend Council in the 1960s, and first stood outside the courthouse in Victoria Avenue.

Later it was moved to the Civic Square and then to the courtyard of the Palace Theatre in Westcliff.

The council received a huge backlash from putting the statue in the Civic Centre, with workers claiming that the sculpture glorified rape as an art form.

Following this outrage, the council opted to move Leda and the Swan to reside at the mayor’s residence, Porters. It was described as a suitable and “appropriately landscaped” area for the sculpture to remain.

It is still there to this day, and has now been stored on Art UK’s website as part of Southend Council’s full collection of sculptures and paintings.

Art UK said its aim with digitising all public owned sculptures was to democratise access to the country’s public art collection, much of which is in storage and therefore not easy to access.

The project, which began this year, is in its very early stages, but the charity believes it will be “eye-opening”.

Sculptures from the last 1,000 years will be recorded, with the project expecting to cost a total of £3.8 million.

By the end of 2020, Art UK estimates around 150,000 sculptures from all over the country will be viewable online by all.

Andrew Ellis, director of Art UK, said: “The variety, the range, is just stunning and what is extraordinary is that it is going to be so much more global. Paintings are predominantly a western European tradition but the sculpture collection is from across the world. “