A Monument to the Unloved: A Conversation on Exhausted Appearances in Public Art

Over the last years, visual artist Henriette Heise has installed two temporary public sculptures entitled The Flanet (flat planet) (2019 and 2023) in parks outside public art galleries in Denmark. Although presented in urban space, these round, flat sculptures are easy to overlook because they materially blend in with their surroundings. In this conversation, Heise and art historian Mathias Danbolt discuss the expectations of visibility and legibility in discourses of public art with a starting point in Heise’s The Flanets that she describes as sculptures that are seemingly “dressing up to disappear.” Following Heise’s proposal to approach The Flanets as “monuments to the unloved,” Danbolt and Heise reflect on the conditions for public sculpture that engage with feelings of exhaustion and hopelessness in the face of planetary crises.