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A teenager from Australia has appeared in court after reportedly defacing a sizable art piece of a legendary being by affixing plastic eyes to it.

The 19-year-old, 19 years old, appeared via phone at Mount Gambier Magistrates Court in the state of South Australia on that day, charged with a single charge of property damage.

Officials commented at the time of the recent event, the municipal authorities explained that surveillance video captured a individual placing fake eyes on the artwork, which residents have dubbed the “Cast in Blue”.

The accused made no plea and informed the court she was ill, as reported by news outlets, with the magistrate recommending her to secure a legal representative before her next court date in December.

A day after the reported event, the local mayor said that restoration to the popular public artwork would be expensive as the adhesive eyes were impossible to be removed without harming the art piece.

“This intentional vandalism to a cherished public artwork is inappropriate and disrespectful,” Mayor Lynette Martin said in September. “It is not harmless fun, it is costly - it is also frustrating to those people of our society who have welcomed Cast in Blue.”

She added the local government would pursue the “significant” repair costs from those responsible for the vandalism.

When the artwork was first proposed, it drew varied responses from the local community due to its cost and design.

Priced at A$136,000 ($89,000; sixty-eight thousand pounds), the artwork depicts a mythical megafauna, with the sculpture’s designers inspired by an prehistoric anteater-like marsupial found in nearby caverns that was “huge, slow-moving, and intriguing”.