Dazwischen oder für meinen Nachbarn / In-between or for My Neighbour

The sculptor Wilhelm Lehmbruck is buried on Duisburg’s Waldfriedhof. The two-part sculpture “Dazwischen oder für meinen Nachbarn” by Erwin Wortelkamp was created on the occasion of the renovation of the crematorium on this cemetery in 2002. It consists of a just over two-metre-high iron casting of a rough-hewn beam and an iron slab, lightly curved towards the first sculpture and installed at a distance of two metres. At a height of about 1.8 metres, a large and massive wooden trunk, whose slightly curved line turns towards the iron form, was fixed to the slab, which creates an interstice shaped like a pointed oval. This empty shape should be regarded as part of the sculpture, just like the distance between the two sculptural steles. It is up to the viewer to decide how they wish to interpret this abstract, archaic-looking constellation: In the context of its surroundings, it can be read as highly abstract Christian symbolism, as well as a reference to the importance of empty spaces in artistic representations or in life.