The Sculpture Park
As guests in the park, you gain insight into contemporary sculptural expression while being able to move at your own pace or settle down in the beautifully landscaped park with its wide variety of species, paths and seating areas.
The sculpture park contains just over 45 sculptures. Most are permanent, while a few are temporarily lined up. The oldest two sculptures have had their place in the park since 1929, but the vast majority have come into being since the establishment of the Art Centre Silkeborg Bad (1992). Especially in the last 10 years, the collection has expanded significantly.
Today, new forms of expression challenge the traditional concept of sculpture. On a walk in the Sculpture Park, you experience how differently artists today express themselves with sculpture. At the same time, the Sculpture Park tells about significant currents and development trends in modern art. Sculpture is today a fairly broad artistic form of expression, embracing both classical imaginative figures, abstract sculptures, country art and installations of various kinds. Today, artists use many different, previously completely unthinkable materials as a medium for their artistic expression. Our park contains works by both Danish and foreign artists.
Audioguides: You can borrow our audio guide at the reception and hear about the individual sculptures. It is free to borrow once you have paid the general admission ticket.
Tour: Groups can also book a guided tour of the Sculpture Park. In addition, we also offer regular public tours of the Sculpture Park, which anyone can book.
The sculptures in the park are open to touch, so that you can feel their shape and materials. However, the sculptures are not suitable for climbing on. Therefore, it is important that adults help children take care of both the artwork and the plants.
Callum Morton: Sisyphus, KunstCentret Silkeborg Bad, 2017/2018
OPLEVELSE OG VIDEN - Skulpturparken ved KunstCentret Silkeborg Bad
HOPE. Sculpture for peace and freedom
New sculpture reveiled June 2024:
Internationally renowned artist Sergei Sviatchenko and the Ukrainian sculptor Egor Zigura stand behind the sculpture which was unveiled June 28 in the Sculpture Park at the Art Center Silkeborg Bad. The sculpture is to give and symbolize hope for Ukraine and for all other places with conflict.
It is 260 cm high and 420 cm long, the bronze sculpture that the Danish-Ukrainian visual artist and architect Sergei Sviatchenko from Viborg has created together with the Ukrainian sculptor, Egor Zigura. The name of the work is HOPE, and it is shaped like a dove with a leaf in its beak.
"HOPE is a dove which, in its dynamics and rhythm, moves with a peaceful leaf in its beak. It is a symbol of the future that we will all be a part of. And this is exactly how I draw it at the beginning of March 2022 after a month of war and my shock at what happened in Ukraine”.
This is what Sergei Sviatchenko, an internationally recognized artist, who settled and has lived in Denmark for 34 years, but was born in Kharkiv, Ukraine, tells us.
The project was made possible on the basis of generous support from Danish ‘Jyske Bank's Almennyttige Foundation’ and the French company ‘Cartier’, so it became possible to cast the sculpture in bronze. In addition, many individuals supported the process, which was initiated more than 2 years ago. The overall plan is to produce three identical works, of which the first sculpture has now been erected in Silkeborg, the next in Brussels and the third in Kyiv, provided the vision is fully realized.
Alongside the sculpture project, Sviatchenko has created another collage work as a print on aluminum with the title "Kharkiv. Riders of Hope". This will also be on show at the unveiling of HOPE, where it is temporarily set up. Here he interprets Picasso's famous work Guernica from 1937. He transfers the historical war tragedy in the Spanish city to Ukrainian Kharkiv and about his meeting with Picasso's Guernica, says the Danish-Ukrainian artist:
”I found the most scary parallels that I responded to as an artist. The tragedy is repeating itself in our days, not in Spain, but in the city where I was born and raised. In the composition, my face appears as a three-year-old boy”.
In addition to conveying his difficult feelings in pictorial form, Sviatchenko has also written a poem about the tragedy of his city and his country:
We lost EVERYTHING in one minute
And only the sky above
We will take it with us
And we will live with it
For a long time until then
While the sun with its rays
Write on it
FAITH HOPE LOVE
The realisation of the sculpture was mad possible with generous support from Jyske Banks Almennyttige Fond, the inauguration was supported by Cartier. The Art Centre Silkeborg Bad coordinated the project and provided a base for HOPE. Thanks also to AFUKA - the French-Ukrainian organization in Nice, Abramovych Foundation in Kyiv, Profilsport, Expopartner, Henrik Hegelund, Skovgaard Museum in Viborg, Christian’s Anlæg, L’Officiel Ukraine, etc.
"Nobody can step into the same river twice" - 99 clay vessels to Heraklit
Ceramic artist Lise Seier Petersen has created a ceramic installation on the basis of the Greek philosopher Heraklits thesis that everything is changing. The 99 clay vessels are located at the Art Center Silkeborg Bad between the exhibition building and lake Ørnsø.
See photo documentation here
Everything is change
The 99 thrown tubs are each mixed with blue clay, red clay, chamotte and paper in various proportions. Most of the clay comes from Sorring, the pottery town, located approximately 15 km east of Silkeborg. The clay vessels have different sizes. The largest vessel has a diameter of between 50 and 85 cm.
Some vessels are unburned, the rest is burned at different temperatures from 300 to 1200 degrees. It provides a color scheme from light gray / pink to yellow, terra cotta, green and dark reddish brown. Because of the burning temperature, most vessels are water soluble. This means that they are vulnerable to weather, water and wind, and eventually they will dissolve, but at different pace. The audience can follow the gradual breakdown of the 99 clay vessels in the sculpture park.
Reflection of the predisposition
Lise Seier Petersen uses the ceramic craft as an exponent of the aesthetic of decay and focuses on the dissolution process. The 99 clay vessels are thought of as a tribute to the ceramic craftsmanship.
The clay vessel is a centuries-old traditional object that has been used for daily use and for the ceremonies of the cult. In this work, the vessel becomes an exponent of basic conditions such as negligence and static to the dynamic.
The material and workmanship is put in a context that opens up for reflection on change and resolution. A clay vessel is usually a concrete, useful thing, but in this work the audience will experience how it gradually breaks down.
Help to document
Lise Seier Petersen encourages the audience to photograph the work's development and put them on the facebook page: www.facebook.com/99.lerkar Photos can also be sent in an email to: mail@liseseierpetersen.dk
Photographer Kirstine Autzen has documented the creation at the National Workshops. The material is published in the book "No one can step into the same river twice". It can be purchased at the Art Center's shop.
The project is supported by Danmarks Nationalbank anniversary fund, Grosser L. F. Fogh's Fund and Esther and Jep Finks Memorial Fund. The work was performed at the National Workshops for Art in 2014.
