Groundbreaking

Åkerbruket, Svedala, SE 2018

The starting point of this design is the archaic act of groundbreaking with a spade. On the access road to the newly opened residential area in rural southern Sweden is an 8-meter, brilliant red sculpture that protrudes diagonally out of the ground, as if it had just been rammed into it there. The sculpture’s form fuses the blade of a spade and two growths towering upward like pick blades, thereby entering into a direct dialog with the site’s historical landmark, which is visible on the horizon: an old windmill from Aggarp. Land clearing and groundbreaking are equal strands of association that take as their theme the transformation of what was once a farming landscape into a new residential area.