Sibelius monument
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Sibelius monument is dedicated to the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865-1957). The monument is located at the Sibelius Park (Sibeliuspuisto) in the district of Töölö in Helsinki, the capital city of Finland.
The monument was designed by Eila Hiltunen and unveiled on September 7, 1967. Originally it sparked a lively debate about the merits and flaws of abstract art, for which reason an effigy of Sibelius was included in the work. It consists of series of more than 600 hollow steel pipes welded together in a wave-like pattern. The purpose of the artist was to capture the essence of the music of Sibelius. The monument weighs 24 tons and measures 8,5 X 10,5 X 8,5 meters.
The monument is popular with tourists. A common trick for the visitors is to put one's head into one of the tubes and to yell something to test the peculiar acoustics.
A smaller version of the monument is located at the Unesco headquarters in Paris. A work with a similar concept, also designed by Hiltunen, is located at the grounds of the United Nations headquarters in New York City.
