The Giraffe
By Bjørn Okholm Skaarup
Located in Greenwich, CT
A giraffe on stilts.
Category
2010s Figurative Sculptures
Materials
Bronze
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Bjørn Okholm SkaarupGiraffe Tall Clown2025
2025
$58,000
£43,975.05
€51,338.81
CA$82,934.33
A$84,213.02
CHF 48,073.30
MX$1,017,570.81
NOK 564,699.30
SEK 563,158.59
DKK 383,798.67
About the Item
Edition of 9
64 x 18 x 18 inches - overall dimensions
The steel base is 22 inches tall.
Bjorn Skaarup holds a MA in History and Art History from the University of Copenhagen, and a PHD in History from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. Skaarup has also furthered his education with post-doctoral studies at the Warburg Institute, London and Columbia University, New York
In addition to his career as a self-taught sculptor, Skaarup has written and illustrated numerous books on historical, archaeological, and anatomical subjects.
"My animal sculptures represent a number of characters that have been given man-made and cultural tools and attributes that underline their particular traits – the dignity and supremacy of the majestic lion, the chivalrous nature of the ermine, the speed of the cheetah, the height of the giraffe, and the heavenly aspirations of the ostrich... The sculptures are a celebration of life and nature and its many intriguing shapes and creatures, all placed in peculiar and surreal encounters between nature and culture. The result is a group of bronze sculptures that combines the gracious and exclusive with the communicative, distorted and humorous."
Okholm Skaarup has created a contemporary bestiary, or classical book of animals, in bronze. Each sculpture presents a whimsical story or allegory to decipher, with sources ranging from ancient fables and art history to music and modern animation. The Majestic Lion, traditional king of the animals, wears the crown and armor of a great monarch in the style of Medici court sculptor Giambologna, yet he sits astride a rocking horse, a reference to his fleeting and jovial power. Frogs reenact Homeric battles in the Batrachomyomachia and Micenaean Horse, while mice peer through spectacles and listen at telephones as The Five Senses. A cheetah rides a scooter to move faster, a giraffe stands on stilts to reach higher, and a kangaroo bounces on a pogo stick—a “kængurustylte” in Okholm Skaarup’s native Danish.
From 1994 to 2004, Okholm Skaarup was an artist at the Danish National Museum, Copenhagen, before moving to Florence and receiving a PhD from the European University Institute in 2009. While in Florence, he studied the work of Renaissance sculptors Donatello, Michelangelo, and Giambologna, learning the vanishing art of large-scale bronze casting.
“I am constantly trying to improve my skills in modeling, and see how far the medium can go,” Skaarup explains.
“How many fun details you can add, how many forms you can create—ideally large, heavy forms that rest on light foundations, so the work appears as vibrant as possible. With bronze, you can make the most dynamic shapes imaginable.”
In Okholm Skaarup’s intricately polychrome work, he explores the voluminous form of a tutu and leotard-clad hippo, which at once references Degas’s Little Dancer of Fourteen Years and Disney’s Fantasia. Another hippo, sprawled in the pose of Ingres’s Grande Odalisque, looks at the viewer over her shoulder with a flirtatious grin. And a dinosaur paleontologist is mystified to discover the Flintstones’ Flintmobile among the rubble.
Okholm Skaarup’s indoor and outdoor sculptures have been the subject of museum exhibitions throughout the world, with notable public exhibitions at the Koldinghus Museum, Kolding, Denmark; the Museo Cenacolo di Ognissanti and Four Seasons Hotel, Florence; Hotel Cipriani, Venice, the Collectivité of St. Barth, and The Bruce Museum, Greenwich, Connecticut. The monumental Hippo Ballerina has been exhibited at Dante Park, opposite Lincoln Center, The Flatiron District, Girl Scouts of America’s New York Headquarters, Pershing Square in New York, and the Ferguson Library, in Stamford, CT.
Bjørn Okholm Skaarup lives and works in New York City.
- Creator:
- Creation Year:2025
- Dimensions:Height: 64 in (162.56 cm)Width: 18 in (45.72 cm)Depth: 18 in (45.72 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Greenwich, CT
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU18118357332
Bjørn Okholm Skaarup
Illustrator and sculptor Bjørn Okholm Skaarup brings vibrant life to his contemporary art through a parade of joyfully imaginative animalistic figures. These creatures are often depicted in anthropomorphic poses, such as a cheetah riding a scooter or a rhino dressed as a harlequin.
Okholm Skaarup was born in 1973 in Rudkøbing, Denmark. In 1994, he began working at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. In 2004, he moved to Florence, Italy, to study the work of the Renaissance masters and learn large-scale bronze casting. He received a PhD in 2009 from the European University Institute.
Now based in New York City, Okholm Skaarup builds on elements of art history in his work, as seen in his numerous renditions of the Hippo Ballerina, which is a whimsical take on Edgar Degas’s The Little Fourteen-Year-Old Dancer with an enthusiastic nod to Disney. Many of his artworks contain a mischievous twist, like his bronze sculpture of a lion with a crown on his head, riding a rocking horse instead of a majestic stallion.
Okholm Skaarup is a member of the Royal British Society of Sculptors and has exhibited his works at many notable venues, including the Koldinghus Museum in Kolding, Denmark, the Bruce Museum in Greenwich, Connecticut, the Four Seasons Hotel in Florence and the Hotel Cipriani in Venice.
On 1stDibs, find authentic Bjørn Okholm Skaarup sculptures, prints and paintings.
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