Denmark’s Little Mermaid sculpture resurfaced to music and fanfare Sunday in the middle of Shanghai’s World Expo, a month after leaving her perch in Copenhagen harbor for the first time ever.
The statue is considered a national treasure in Denmark and the decision to send it to Shanghai for the six-month World Expo, which starts Saturday, was contentious. It has been a major tourist attraction since 1913.
"She has since then sat quietly on her rock on Copenhagen Harbour in Copenhagen until today," Christopher Bo Bramsen, the commissioner general of Denmark’s Expo pavilion said at an unveiling ceremony.
"From today the stature of the Little Mermaid will be the centre of the Danish Pavilion at Expo 2010," he said.
Hundreds of Chinese Expo preview ticket holders gathered to watch as a red velvet cover was lifted of the statue to reveal her sitting in a pool of water bathed in sunlight at the heart of Denmark’s spiraling white pavilion.
"Millions of tourists will be mesmerized by her beauty," Shanghai deputy mayor Tu Guangshao said at the unveiling.
Up to 100 million people — 95 percent of them Chinese — are expected to attend the Expo and Danish officials estimate the statue will help attract 200,000 visitors a day to the pavilion and three million over six months.
"We wanted to do something really extraordinary," said Mike Lippert, the pavilion’s creative director.
"The idea of bring a national icon just came to us and we knew this was the idea we wanted to do. It is a strong signal of openness not only to China but the entire world," he said.
The 175-kilogram (385-pound) statue by Edvard Eriksen was inspired by a character created by Hans Christian Andersen in an 1837 fairytale and known as the "old lady of the sea".
The decision to let the statue go was the subject of heated debate in Denmark, especially in Copenhagen, where a majority of residents were opposed to the idea up until the end of last year, according to polls.
But the city of Copenhagen, which owns the sculpture, nonetheless decided to send her to the Shanghai World Expo to represent Denmark.
The move has made the Danish pavilion one of the Expo’s most talked-about attractions in China, where every schoolchild reads Andersen’s stories.
A temporary video installation by Ai Weiwei, one of China’s most famous artists and an outspoken social critic, will be unveiled in Copenhagen in May, in the mermaid’s former perch.
It will project live images of the mermaid and her visitors at the Expo.
