LECTURE: TERNE THORSEN: CHALLENGING MONUMENTS: PROTEST, VANDALISM AND EVERYDAY ICONOCLASM

About the lecture

In recent years, the global wave of protests directed at public statues and monuments has made it clear that iconoclasm is not only a part of overthrowing regimes and zealously practising religion, but a part of the negotiation of public space and the construction of history, memory and identity. Although these events have nuanced the image of the brutal iconoclast, iconoclasm is still often seen as something marginal – acts carried out by unstable individuals, agitated protesters or fanatics. In contrast, this lecture will examine how iconoclastic interactions are far more common and widespread than previously considered. Departing from her study of a unique and never examined photographic archive depicting more than 60 years of interactions with public statues, sculptures, and monuments in Copenhagen, Terne Thorsen will unfold how iconoclastic interactions are an integral and important part of how people relate to, live and interact with public monuments.

About the lecture series

Monumental sculpture has taken central stage in contemporary discussions on colonial history, structural racism, inequality, and marginalization. Recently public statues of Danish kings, missionaries, and explorers have been confronted by activists seeking to address unfinished histories of Danish colonialism. Statues of Hans Egede in Nuuk and Copenhagen have been daubed in red paint with “DECOLONIZE!” and “RACIST!” added to their plinths, and a plaster bust of King Frederik V has been thrown into the waters of the Copenhagen harbor. Artists have also erected new critical public monuments, such as Jeannette Ehlers and La Vaughn Belle’s I Am Queen Mary (2018) – the first statue of a Black woman in Denmark, and the first monument to commemorate histories of resistance against Danish colonial rule.

Moving Monuments seeks to problematize the assumption that public monuments are static entities made for eternity. In contrast, the project focuses on the material, historical, and political transformations and reframings involved as monumental sculptures move between different sites and across time. The core-team members each work on individual projects, which will be presented within the frames of this lecture series, shifting the theoretical and methodological orientation of research on monumental sculpture in Denmark and beyond. In doing so, the project creates new critical platforms for discussing the life and afterlife of public monuments as dynamic historical agents whose functions and contexts change across time and space, the project examines the intersections of art, power, and imperial history.