WATCH NOW: Crews wrap up a whirlwind week of removing Confederate monuments in Richmond

After a whirlwind week, crews tasked with removing the city’s Confederate iconography have finished their job — for now, at least.

On Thursday morning, workers dismantled what remained of the monument to Confederate naval commander Matthew Fontaine Maury: a 10,000-pound globe sitting atop the monument. The statue of Maury himself was removed one week prior, on July 2.

Later on Thursday afternoon, the crew moved to Monroe Park, where it hauled away a statue of Joseph Bryan, a Richmond businessman who owned the Richmond Times-Dispatch and two of its predecessors. Bryan was a 19-year-old member of Mosby’s Rangers during the Civil War. His statue was erected in June 1911.

In Monroe Park, crews also removed a stone cross dedicated to Confederate Gen. Fitzhugh Lee, who was a major general in the Confederate army, governor of Virginia from 1886 to 1890, and the nephew of Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Several empty stone pedestals now line Monument Avenue — with the exception of the state-controlled monument to Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Arthur Ashe monument.

Two out-of-state construction companies aided removals throughout the week: Smedley Rigging and Crane Co. from Wisconsin, and Summit Masonry and Building Restoration from Connecticut.

Also on scene were artists Paul DiPasquale, who sculpted the Arthur Ashe memorial, and welder Jillian Holland. The duo first intersected in 2004, when working on the 24-foot statue of King Neptune in Virginia Beach.

In following years, they’ve worked together on several different projects. DiPasquale jokes that Holland — one of few women in the male-dominated welding industry — is his “secret weapon.”

This past week, they were tasked with the behind-the-scenes job of formulating the methods for statue removal.

DiPasquale and Holland, along with the rest of the crew, approached each day with several backup plans — armed only with “predictions” on how best to detach the bronze statues from their plinths.

Luckily, each statue left intact.

“You don’t always have to destroy things to get something removed,” Holland said.

The A.P. Hill monument was initially slated for removal as well. But, because the Confederate general’s gravesite lies beneath the monument, legal and regulatory challenges entangle its departure.

DiPasquale and Holland see the city’s vacant pedestals as invitations for new artwork — but also as statements in their own right.

He added that the act of removing the statues became “performance art.” When the first statue came down — that of Confederate Gen. Stonewall Jackson — Holland described the energy among the thousands present as palpable.

“You could hear the joy, you could hear the relief,” she said. “There was just this weight lifted off the city of Richmond.”

DiPasquale and Holland are relieved, too.

After a week of hourslong removal processes in the summer heat, they were glad to relax and reflect in DiPasquale’s kitchen on Thursday afternoon. DiPasquale said the crews are done.

Now, with the monuments gone, they’re looking forward to the future of the city’s public spaces.

“We really are in a position to choose more art,” DiPasquale said.