The Worst Sculptor in the World

We celebrate Robert Jacobsen (4 June 1912 – 26 January 1993), Danish creator in the realm of the plastic arts. Robert inhabited the artistic niche of great sculptors such as Alexandros of Antioch and the ancient Greek masters, and moderns such as Auguste Rodin.

Jacobsen’s claim to fame is as the Worst Sculptor in the World.  A modernist (naturally) who enthusiastically embraced the avant-garde through the toxic COBRA movement of northern Europe, working with welder, mask and subsidized iron, he and his ilk dispensed with hard work and consideration of structure, theme and aesthetics, preferring to hide their laziness and lack of talent behind “spontaneity and experiment”, drawing “inspiration” from children’s drawings, primitive art forms and bad abstract daubs.

Consider his superb “Komposition in Eisen” (loosely translated as “Piece of Iron Garbage”) which graces the front of a modern building in lucky Vienna (main image).

Or what about the intricate post-baroque of “Loki and his cronies” that enhances a public park (somewhere)…

…and for a grand finale, his matchless “Tørskind Man” that synthesizes the magic of the Tørskind Gravel Pit Sculpture Park.

Truly, Robert is the Worst, and his work provides a fitting secular crypt for the lost art of sculpture.  Happy birthday, you cruel, stupid, evil bastard.

2019 update: we recently found, in the Adelaide Hills, at the gateway to Littlehampton, a work of which the Master would be proud…a stone amoeba that seems to be giving us the finger.

The Varnished Culture, however, weeps for the future. There’s a shocker in Unley as well: Thanks Unley Council! ‘Urban Style, Village Charm, Subsidised Mediocrity….‘

And lookee here, in Rundle Mall, at great expense:

It goes on, and gets worse…here’s “A Sculpture for Mary Wollstonecraft” by Maggi Hambling. Who will vindicate the rights of Art?