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Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions, and one of the plastic arts. Durable sculptural processes originally used carving (the removal of material) and modelling (the addition of material, as clay), in stone, metal, ceramics, wood and other materials but, since modernism, shifts in sculptural process led to an almost complete freedom of materials and process. A wide variety of materials, that may be worked by removal, such as carving, assembled by welding, modelling or cast.

This is how Wikipedia describes sculpture, a wide variety of materials worked by removal, but a brazilian artist , Néle Azevedo would describe her amazing project called the Minimum Monument different somehow, small scale ice sculptures installations called Army of Melting Men have invaded the monuments in contemporary cities. “The homage is rendered to the anonymous,” the artist says. “The ice bodies disappear in the city, in a shared experience.”

The small army is conceived by filling molds with water and freezing them, and after, each sculpture has been individually retouched before shipping to the installation point in order to be somehow unique. Initially the installations were pretty lonely, the artist started with single figures in public spaces and over time the number grew, representing, in my opinion, that we have to take part and be involved somehow in this phenomenon and change something, one by one.The most recent installation piece was in Stavanger, Norway and had 1,300 figures both male and female.

In 2009 the artist partnered with WWF, which stands for World Wildlife Fund, to create an army of 1000 tiny ice sculptures in Berlin, Germany`s Gendarmenmarkt Square, in advance of the United Nations Climate Change conference. The installation art was intended to point out and highlight the direct effect of climate change in the Artic on the whole globe and the future of humanity and nature.In the 23 degree temperatures (73 degrees Fahrenheit), the army began melting away after about 20 minutes, and the installation was scheduled to coincide with the release of a report by the WWF on global warming and climate change.

The report of the WWF was Arctic Climate Feedbacks: Global Implications, and his purpose was to warn that melting ice could cause sea-levels to rise more than 3.3 ft by 2100. While the effects of global climate change are affecting all of us somehow and the melting polar ice caps could have dire consequences, the public installations created by Néle Azevedo warning us that the world as we know it it`s about to change, forever.