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Forget-me-not (Vergeet-mij-niet)

Trudi van den Berg, Jos Steenmeijer

About this artwork.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the land under the Beckerweg industrial estate was used as a landfill for, among other things, gas factory tar, which caused heavy metals to be deposited. In 1995, the municipality started a large-scale soil remediation project, which was only partially successful. In order to prevent the remaining pollution from spreading, the groundwater under the site is being pumped away and collected in a concrete well. This remediation pit now forms the foundation of the artwork Forget-me-not. The municipality, which wanted a form of remembrance of the many efforts made to clean up the Beckerweg site, commissioned this sculpture.
 
Around the well protruding from the ground are five yes marbles which together form a flower. The “leaves” move through a built-in motor, giving it a sense of a budding and closing flower. The title Forget-me-not refers both to the dirt that is still in the ground and the lesson we have to learn from it, and to the flower itself and the "clean" soil on which it can now blossom again.
 
Plants often form part of Trudi van den Berg's works of art. In this case, the prickly blue crawlers on the embankment of the well serve as a natural protection for the sculpture against overly intrusive viewers.

Location.

Beckerweg

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Facts & Figures.