Elmgreen and Dragset's male little mermaid

Han is a public sculpture commissioned by the city of Elsingore to Elmgreen & Dragset. The title means ‘he’ in Danish, but it is actually also the name of Michael’s boyfriend back in London. The work is situated in front of the Krongborg castle which is the very location of Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

The sculpture is so to say a contemporary and male paraphrase of the danish national icon the Little Mermaid. It depicts a young man posing on a rock made in stainless steel. further more a hydraulic  mechanism can shut the eyes of the sculpture for a split second every 30 minutes. Beautiful !

Elmgreen and Dragset

Diving Board/Powerless Structures, Fig. 11, 1997

Diving board penetrating the window in the museum’s reading room MDF, slide-proof rubber, aluminum, glass, 60 x 75 x 200 cm

The Louisiana Exhibition, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, 1997; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2000

Courtesy of the artists and Victoria Miro.