Village pump
Artwork by Arie Fonk from 1987 on the site of the old village pump in the centre of Rolde. Since 2022 the pump has been giving water again, including for walkers on the Pieterpad long-distance trail.
The artwork stands on the site of the original village pump. Arie Fonk designed it in 1987, when Rolde was 800 years old. According to the plaque, it was presented by the local shopkeepers and the boermarken, the farmers' associations, of what was then the municipality of Rolde.
The work is about time. A wall of seven sections, each of its own height, stands for different periods. A continuous bench represents time, which spans all the periods. Fonk also sees transience in it: of the artwork itself and of everything in life.
The pump had not worked for a long time. On 16 June 2022, alderman Ivo Berghuis and Arie Fonk unveiled the restored artwork, and Berghuis was the first to taste the water. To him it is a practical work of art, in which form and function come together. Walkers and cyclists, including those on the Pieterpad, can fill up with water there.
