Rachel Levin is a popular art lecturer who often lectures at the Bernard Betel Centre for our weekly Tuesday Lifelong Learning Lectures. In her series of ‘Unconventional Materials’ she introduces artists from all over the world using unconventional materials to create their art.
Giant Troll Sculptures Made of Recycled Wood Greet Visitors in the Great Outdoors
Danish recycling artist Thomas Dambo is known for his incredible outdoor sculptures in a shape of huge mythical trolls. Thomas calls himself “a dedicated dumpster-diver from Denmark”, and he created a worldwide troll-hunting phenomenon.
He describes his life as “going off the beaten path”. As a kid who was crawling into the bushes, jumping over fences, and digging through trash. Nowadays, Thomas is considered the world’s leading recycle artist.
Thomas has spent the past nine years making giant troll sculptures. He hopes that his trolls will continue to draw millions of people away from their screens and get them out into the incredible natural world that surrounds us.
The creation of his first 100 trolls is described in a book: “Trash, Trolls and Treasure Hunts” accompanied with hundreds of photos, poems, fairy tales, and behind-the-scenes highlights. Thomas and his crew, and with the help of thousands of volunteers, scavenged over 250 tons of scrap wood to build trolls. By now his team has built trolls in 17 countries (and counting!).
Thomas says “Trash is a treasure” and by sending people on a treasure hunt to find art made of garbage, he hopes to create a new appreciation for the things we throw away. The ugly single-use mentality that floods our world with trash. The outdoor troll sculptures are hand-built from recycle wood products such as old shelves, parts of furniture, pallets, and branches from fallen trees.
Over the summer of 2018, the Morton Arboretum in Northern Illinois welcomed some unusual new guests, a whimsical tribe of wooden trolls. Crafted by Thomas Dambo, these mythical creatures are the sought-after stars of the outdoor Museum’s site-specific exhibit.
Troll Hunt is an invitation the visiting public to wonder around the woods and find six folkloric figures hidden within the arboretum. Thomas Dambo uses scrap wood and leftover construction materials to create these gigantic sculptures. You might think that the sculptures would be intimidating, but they actually create the opposite effect. Many of Thomas pieces playfully interact with their surroundings, children as well as adults loves them.
Starting in 2017 and over the next three years, Thomas Dambo created six enormous sculptures. He scattered his friendly giants around the city of Copenhagen as a way to encourage people to visit the offbeat areas of his hometown. The giant sculptures are a group effort involving local volunteers helping assemble the works. 600 wood pallets were used to create the six giants. The scavenged wood come together to produce incredible hidden giants. Each giant is named after a volunteer and can be found using a map prepared by Thomas. Thomas says: “It invites the viewers to go on a treasure hunt, not only to see the sculptures, but also to discover hidden gems in nature”.
