| Carl Nielsen Monument | |
| Location: | Copenhagen, Denmark |
| Designer: | Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen |
| Type: | Equestrian statue |
| Material: | Bronze and granite |
| Open: | 17 December 1939 |
| Dedicated To: | Carl Nielsen |
The Carl Nielsen Monument, located at the corner of Grønningen and Store Kongensgade in central Copenhagen, Denmark, is a monument to Danish composer Carl Nielsen created by his wife Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen. It depicts a young man playing pan-pipes on a wingless Pegasus and is also known as The Genius of Music (Danish: Musikkens Genius|links=no). The original plaster model is owned by the Carl Nielsen Museum in Odense.
The monument is an allegorical equestrian statue. Horse and man are depicted in a dynamic pose. The naked young man with pan-pipes represents Pan, god of music in Greek mythology. His face strongly resembles that of a young Carl Nielsen.[1] The Pegasus figure had wings in Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen's earlier models but the wings were left out in the final design.
Carl-Nielsen has commented on the design that "What I wanted to show in my figure is the forward movement, the sense of life, the fact that nothing stands still."
170px|thumb|alt=The artist places her left hand on the neck of the model of a horse whose head is above hers|Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen and Pegasus – first model of her Carl Nielsen monument in her studio in Civiletatens MaterialgårdCarl Nielsen died on 3 October 1931. The monument was a donation from the Committee for the Creation of a Monument to the Composer Carl Nielsen and the Foundation for the Advancement of Artistic Purposes (Danish: Fonden til kunstneriske Formaals Fremme).[2]
Anne Marie Carl-Nielsen was commissioned to design the monument. She worked on it in her studio in Civiletatens Materialgård at Frederiksholms Kanal 26. She wrote: "I wanted to take the winged horse, eternal symbol of poetry, and place a musician on its back. He was to sit there between the rushing wings blowing a reed pipe out over Copenhagen". Dispute about her design and a shortfall in funding meant that the monument was delayed and that Anne Marie herself ended up subsidising it. It was finally unveiled on 17 December 1939.
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