Image: MAPS – Museum of Art in Public Space
MAPS – Museum of Art in Public Space has commissioned Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama to create ‘Labyrinths’, a monumental site-specific work made from reused bricks gathered from historically and culturally significant buildings across Denmark. Installed on the museum’s forecourt in Køge, the work is scheduled to remain on view from 12 June through 31 December 2026.
‘Labyrinths’ is the first project in MAPS’s new programme series ‘Tomorrow’s Public Art’, through which the museum says it will invite international artists to create new site-specific works in Køge. The series examines what public art can be today and how shared urban spaces can become places for imagining and testing possible futures. The commission was developed with Red Clay Studio and children and young people from Køge Municipality.
The bricks used in Mahama’s installation come from Fredensborg Palace, Vor Frue Kloster, Vestre Prison, the Natural History Museum of Denmark and MAPS’s own building, a former school in Køge. According to the museum, the original sites represent institutions and structures associated with power, faith, law, learning and knowledge. Their materials have been brought together in a new public work rather than presented as architectural remnants.
Mahama’s practice frequently gives renewed life to used and discarded materials. Previous works have incorporated jute sacks, shoeshine boxes, school blackboards, railway tracks, train carriages and other everyday objects. MAPS describes these materials as carrying histories of global trade, labour, colonial connections, circulation, wear and human movement. In ‘Labyrinths’, the bricks become the basis for a structure intended to create passages, encounters and moments of reflection between the museum and the city.
More than 1,000 children and young people from Køge Municipality participated in workshops connected to the project. Through the workshops, they considered what objects can remember and what holds meaning for them, then left marks, words and impressions on the bricks. Their contributions add new layers to the work’s engagement with community, memory and the future.
MAPS was renamed in January 2025, having previously operated as KØS – Museum for kunst i det offentlige rum. The institution traces its origins to the Køge Sketch Collection, founded in 1977, and holds more than 19,000 sketches, models and preparatory works for realised and unrealised public-art projects. Its current programme combines exhibitions, research, education and commissions, including the long-term international exhibition ‘The Story of Public Art’, which presents 90 artists from 40 countries in a changing four-year format.
The museum offers a 15-minute introduction to ‘Labyrinths’ every Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday at 1pm. The guided sessions are included with paid admission and focus on the histories embedded in the reused bricks and the participation of Køge’s children and young people. MAPS is located at Nørregade 29, 4600 Køge.
