Vorausschauende Maßnahme / Anticipatory Measure

Anticipatory measures are important in times of climate change, nor can it hurt take measured decisions, let alone to “measure twice and cut once.” This sculpture by the artist collective Inges Idee manages to translate all this into a simple yet poignant image whose tongue-in-cheek humour makes the beholder smile despite the serious subject. The coloured steel sculpture was installed on a sandbank in the middle of the river Weser, evoking not only a measuring tape gone rogue but, with the double curve of its “tail,” the vertically rising “neck” and the small “head” formed by the hook, a snake or sea monster. One of the sculpture’s nicknames is “Pegelschlange” (Level Snake), as it allows viewers to keep track, both poetically and quite practically, of the water level of the Weser. When the level is low, the sculpture stands high and dry on the sandbank, at high tide it disappears more and more in the floods. The historically highest water level is marked by a red colour element amid the yellow-black colouring modelled on a conventional measuring tape and conveys a rough idea of what it means when this level is reached.

The Weserfreunde e.V. in Minden campaigned for the realisation of this sculpture for more than two years before it was inaugurated on 1 May 2022.