1000 melting men

I caught a glimpse of these ice sculptures on Yahoo! News and was strangely drawn to them…so I decided to find out what they were in aid of.  Their simplistic forms reminded me of some of Antony Gormley’s figure sculptures, and I thought how clever it was to sculpt such small forms from ice.  I wondered about the method of their creation, were they sculpted in a giant freezer so as not to melt before completion?  Initially I was quite surprised to discover that they were installed by the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF),  however it does make sense as they were produced as a medium by which to visualize the effects of global warming.  Created by Brazilian artist Nele Azevedom the 1000 ice sculptures were placed on the steps of the music hall in Berlin’s Gendarmenmarkt Square yesterday.  

They began melting 30 minutes in, what with temperatures around 23 degrees Celsius.  I like this simple, yet effective project and think that the human forms really symbolize the fact that global warming will affect us all.  On Wednesday the WWF announced that the effects of global warming are more serious than anticipated, and in a statement by the head of the Foundation, James Leape said "We need to listen now to these signals from the arctic, and take the necessary action in Copenhagen this December to get a deal that quickly and effectively limits greenhouse gas emissions."  These issues obviously need to be addressed and therefore promoted to the world, and I think that installations such as this from the WWF are an eye-catching and creative way to achieve this.  These ice figures certainly act as a somber reminder to us all.