Copyrighted - Edvard Eriksen
The Little Mermaid
by Edvard Eriksen, 1913
Details
- Year
- 1913
- Medium
- Bronze
- Size
- 125 cm (49 in) tall
Edvard Eriksen sculpted this bronze figure in 1913, inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale. The Little Mermaid sits on a rock at Copenhagen's Langelinie pier, gazing wistfully at the harbor. She has become Denmark's most recognized symbol and one of the world's most visited sculptures.
Brewer Carl Jacobsen commissioned the work after seeing a ballet adaptation of Andersen's story. Eriksen used his wife Ellen as the model for the mermaid's body, though the face was modeled by ballerina Ellen Price, who had impressed Jacobsen in the title role. The sculpture depicts the moment the mermaid has traded her tail for human legs.
The bronze has survived notable abuse. Vandals have decapitated her twice, sawed off her arm, covered her in paint, and even blown her off her rock with explosives. Each time she has been repaired or recast from the original mold, which the Eriksen family still guards. Despite her small size, under five feet tall, she draws over a million visitors annually to her waterfront perch.
About The Little Mermaid
She's surprisingly small: just 125 cm (4 feet 1 inch) tall and weighs 175 kg (385 pounds). Most visitors expect something much larger. She sits on a granite boulder at the Langelinie promenade in Copenhagen's harbor. The bronze figure was unveiled on August 23, 1913.
Danish sculptor Edvard Eriksen created her. Carl Jacobsen (son of the Carlsberg brewery founder) commissioned the statue in 1909 after seeing a ballet based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale. Ballerina Ellen Price modeled for the head, but refused to pose nude, so Eriksen used his own wife Eline as the body model.
Many times. She's been beheaded twice (1964 and 1998), had her arm sawed off in 1984, been covered in paint multiple times, and was even blown off her rock with explosives in 2003. Each time, she's been restored. Since 1965, the statue on display is a replica. The original is kept in the Brussels City Museum.
She depicts a scene from Hans Christian Andersen's 1837 fairy tale in which a young mermaid gives up her life in the sea to gain a human soul and the love of a prince. The statue shows her mid-transformation, sitting on the rocks with legs instead of a tail, looking wistfully toward the shore. She's become Copenhagen's most recognized symbol.
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