Ludwig Leichhardt Memorial
Ludwig Leichhardt Memorial, 2013, antique-glass laminated on safety-glass, stainless-steel, bronze, 370cm (from the water-surface) x 30 cm x 12cm.
This memorial pays homage to Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig Leichhardt, the celebrated Prussian explorer and naturalist who is famous for his exploration of the Australian continent in the mid 1800s. It was erected in cooperation with the Amt Lieberose / Oberspreewald in the waters of Schwielochsee at the Leichhardtstrand in Goyatz / Brandenburg in 2013, as part of the bicentennial celebrations of Leichhardt’s birth.
The memorial is made of glass, stainless-steel and bronze. On the glass I have incorporated excerpts from Leichhardt’s Journal An Overland Expedition in Australia, from Moreton Bay to Port Essington, a Distance of Upwards of 3000 Miles, During the Years 1844-1845, dealing with his constant struggles during the course of his first successful expedition. The bronze eucalyptus and banksia leaves in the two smaller open sections of the stele symbolise Leichhardt’s botanical collection.
My approach to the historical figure of Leichhardt is not a scholarly but rather an emotional one. I am interested in the inner forces that drive people to leave their homes and face extremes. Many others of that era, including my great-grandmother, who travelled from Hamburg as a girl with her family for Australia in 1845, left civilisation to pursue personal goals or dreams under very harsh conditions in strange and distant lands.
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More about Ludwig Leichhardt at: www.leichhardtland.de