Mermaid turns 90
She’s been beheaded twice, her arm has been amputated and vandals keep pouring paint over her.
Despite all this, the Little Mermaid has made it to her 90th birthday. So Copenhagen officials plan to hold a party today to celebrate the longevity of the Danish capital’s most famous landmark.
The statue is based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, published in 1837, about a mythical sea king’s mermaid daughter. Carl Jacobsen, founder of Denmark’s Carlsberg breweries and an arts patron, commissioned Danish sculptor Edvard Eriksen in 1909 to create a mermaid statue. He finished it in 1913.
The statue’s international fame took off after it was beheaded in 1963. No arrests were ever made and a new head was cast from the original mold. In 1984, someone sawed off her right arm, which was also replaced. The statue was beheaded again in 1998 but the head was found and re-welded.
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