André Prah: The Ice Horses of Ladoga

Photo: Joachim Lundgren

The installation Ice Horses of Ladoga is inspired by an event during the Second World War in 1941, recounted by the Italian writer Curzio Malaparte in his book Kaputt. According to the account, the Finnish troops had surrounded a Soviet artillery regiment and its horses when the Finns set the forest on fire. Terrified, the horses hurled themselves through the flames and into Lake Ladoga in an attempt to escape. Paralyzed by the freezing cold, they clung to one another. During the night, a north wind swept down from Murmansk, turning nearly a thousand frozen horses into an ice monument to the horrors of war.

The story of the ice horses became a lifelong mission for the artist André Prah (1941–2026). Born in Slovenia, he arrived in Sweden as a war child in 1946. At the age of 60 André Prah started working with sculpture after many years as an illustrator and political cartoonist for the Swedish newspaper Expressen, among others. Many of his works revolve around the history and stories of the Second World War.

The installation The Ice Horses of Ladoga is located near the parking space and on a grassy area near the sauna.

Read more about André Prah and the Ice Horses of Ladoga here.