Hans Haacke - Gift Horse

A bronze sculpture can be found on the Fourth Plinth of Trafalgar Square. It comes in a form of a skeletal horse that is Hans Haacke’s Gift Horse. It was unveiled on 5 March 2015, becoming the 10^th commissioned art installation for the Fourth Plinth. It’ll be taken down on 6 March 2016.

Strangely enough, the Fourth Plinth was originally intended to have a statue of William IV on horseback but due to lack of funds, it did not materialise.

The sculpture was inspired by a painting of Inspired by a painting of George Stubbs (The Anatomy of the Horse, 1766), which can be found in the National Gallery. The sculpture is done as a tribute to George Stubbs and economist Adam Smith. Haacke describes it as “an invitation to think about whether the invisible hand of the market does promote general welfare or whether there's a misunderstanding, or whether it is totally wrong."

With the apparent skeletal features of the horse, a LED live FSTE 100 ticker of London’s Stock Exchange in a form of a bow/ribbon is attached a leg of the Gift Horse. This of course beings about the intended notion for “experimentation and debate” looking at money and power through an art form. The sculpture weighs at 1,700kg and is 4.57m tall.

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