The Little Mermaid
Small bronze harbor statue of a fairy-tale figure, repeatedly beheaded and vandalized yet always restored.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to The Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen traces its history of vandalism: beheaded in 1964 by an art collective, beheaded again in 1998 with the head mailed to a TV station, and doused in paint more than once over the decades. It also tells the story of Carl Jacobsen, the Carlsberg heir who commissioned the statue in 1909 after seeing a ballet of the Hans Christian Andersen tale, and the unusual arrangement behind the sculptor's model. The statue still sits on its harbor rock today, barely four feet tall.
This audio guide was created using AI.
Similar places
Langelinie
Waterside pier and park with a bronze mermaid statue that has survived decades of vandalism and repair.
Gefion Fountain
Bronze fountain of a Norse goddess and her four ox-sons tearing an island from the earth.
Højbro Plads
Cobbled square with a rearing bronze horseman honoring the city's legendary founding bishop.
The King's Garden
Baroque royal garden of lime-tree avenues, rose beds and fairy-tale statues around a Renaissance summer castle.
Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
Art museum built from a brewer's private sculpture collection, with a palm-filled glass-domed winter garden and Egyptian mummies below.
Elephant Gate and Tower
Granite elephants carrying a copper-domed tower over the historic entrance to a brewery complex.