Pickaxe

As if it had fallen from the sky, a twelve-metre-high pickaxe is stuck in the ground on the banks of the Fulda, as if the gigantic Hercules had hurled it downhill into the city in a high arc. Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen created the oversized tool as a contribution to documenta 7 in 1982. As a site-specific work, the "Pickaxe" inscribes itself into its surroundings. It refers to the history of Kassel and its reconstruction after the Second World War. For decades, the Pop Art artist Oldenburg transformed everyday objects into humorous monuments.