Single route, Rotterdam North

With a powerful pose, the four-time Olympic champion crosses the imaginary finish line from 1948 here. For a bronze sculpture, the pose actually makes the balance unstable - the sculptor Han Rehm has done this well. Local residents watch over the sports heroine who sometimes suddenly wears a sports shirt. 'Mrs Blankers, we cleaned you up today. You were completely covered in bird poop,” one note reads.

In the crisis year of 1931, the municipality asked several Rotterdam sculptors to carve keystones for the four bridges over the Statensingel, as a source of income and for decoration. The famous painter and sculptor Hendrik Chabot decorated the Van Aerssenbrug with a mask and a boy on an easel. The striking mask shows how Chabot was one of the first and most important expressionists in the Netherlands.

The humorous sculptor Leendert Bolle, who also carved the abstract animal figures for the poles at the entrance to Diergaarde Blijdorp, shows with his sculptures by Henry Ford (on
a car) and Charlie Chaplin that he traveled through America, an ode to the great icons of those crisis years.

Herman Bieling was fanatically involved in international avant-gardes, a member of the legendary Rotterdam artist group Branding and later in the war supported the German occupiers. With these stone masks on the Statenbrug, he shows his interpretation of cubism, shallow surfaces with expressive heads in graphic lines.

Sculptor Adriaan van der Plas depicted a fishmonger and a woman's face for his keystones, subdued in an organic style full of intimacy. At the same time, expressionist influences shine through in the rolling stylization. As a tribute, streets in Hillegersberg have been named after Van der Plas and Leendert Bolle.

In 2013, the canal plan was crowned with a seat by Guido Marsille. The tree-trunk benches in terrazzo ceramics have a penchant for 19th-century romantic decors and imitations of nature. As a contrast, Onno Poiesz placed bronze statues that seem to have appeared out of nowhere: boots and a semi-abstract gemstone, unreal as from the Superman films.

Isolated on an island, this bronze youngster by Henk Visch has been waving since 2014. Is he welcoming the commuters coming out of the station or is he trying to tell us something else? Is he trying to keep up with the dynamics of the city?

"Then I'll do it myself," thought assistant JH Baas when station architect Van Ravesteyn told him about the high prices of the famous sculptor Henry Moore, whom he had inquired about. That is why Baas himself made two Moore-like sculptures for next to the entrance. These have been relocated in the current station where they also return as a decorative pattern.

At the end of the last century, local residents used art as a means of combating the impoverishment of the neighbourhood. For example, a resident took care of the broken sculpture of three fish with child figures, designed in the mid-twentieth century by sculptor Gerard Héman. Artist Ronald Motta assembled the fish into the current fountain, which was unveiled in 1998 by boxer Regilio Tuur about opposite the house where Héman lived and worked for forty years.

According to artist Tom Waakop Reijers, his shiny doorbell indicates that he receives more visitors and assignments than colleagues. This image from 1996 shows exactly what the landscaping of these canals are intended for, to relax and enjoy. This statue was also a residents' initiative to improve the neighbourhood, revealed because the canal had existed for a hundred years.

From his youth on the Provenierssingel, the Arnhem artist Klaas Gubbels, known for his stylized coffee pots, remembers how he was bitten by a swan. Hence the title of this stacked image that rises into the weeping willow, in bright contrasting yellow, realized on the initiative of residents who also bought a duck decoy and released ducks in the canal.

This abstract block sculpture by Margot Zanstra stands on the sidewalk in front of the Akragon building, which is now used by David Lloyd and is part of the former Technikon school complex. This work of art appears to be a shaky construction of cubes, but has been rhythmically fighting against the architecture since 1971.

In 1963 Karel Appel was approached through the intercession of architect Huig Maaskant for an art commission for the main facade of the then new school complex Technikon. The stained glass-in-concrete work has bright, contrasting colours. The abstract composition has organic elements: about five human or animal forms are suggested, sometimes only by the presence of large round shapes, which are reminiscent of eyes. Since 2013, the schoolyard has a unique water square designed by De Urbanisten.

A concrete relief by artist Kees Franse hangs above the entrance to the Rotterdam City Archives. The building was designed by architect Maaskant and completed in 1963. It was intended as a workshop for the Rijks Automobiele Centrale (RAC), the government agency that managed the vehicles of the Tax and Customs Administration, PTT and Rijkswaterstaat, among others. That is why there were originally petrol pumps under the concrete canopy.

Since 1968, an abstract metal relief by André Volten (149-1925), one of the most important post-war Dutch sculptors, has been placed on the kink of the 'Katshoek' office building at Heer Bokelweg 2002, the office of OMA architects, among others. The work is clearly designed for the place it occupies: the lines of the architecture are repeated and at the same time twisted into a new image. Unfortunately, during the renovation of the entrance a few years ago, the artwork was also painted black, making the relief almost invisible.

A nautical facade relief by Loeki Metz adorns the Gele Gebouw, a community building with creative companies from the manufacturing industry in Zomerhofstraat. The theme is the canal and port, which is of course typical for the port city of Rotterdam. The seas are reduced to an abstract form, in which a classic sailing ship sails in the middle - trade and shipping as the center of the globe.

To make musing and slowing down possible, the art of the canals can be divided into seating areas and viewing works. Jeroen Doorenweerd designed these benches in 2004 on a bright blue background, which are arranged like a grandstand. Good for fishing, but also to experience the city as a theater.

Artist Marcelle van Bemmel made this granite poem in 2005 that can only be read in the water reflection. This requires attention and therefore invites you to think about how time passes and how close history is to the 19th-century canals in the middle of a rapidly changing city.

The penguins were created in 2002 by Herman Lamers from the 'Strategic Neighborhood Approach North' project. The residents came up with the idea to give the art application the theme of 'wind rose', as a metaphor for a multi-colored society that has come here from all directions. Lamers was asked to add a playful element. He chose two penguins, because they are a popular species thanks to their cuddliness factor and the fact that their stature resembles that of humans. For example, some people think the statues look strikingly like Dutch people, with beer bellies and all.

In 1941, a crashing British war plane managed to maneuver to the canal in such a way that it did not hit the buildings, which saved many civilian lives. In 1946 this relief of a floating male figure was unveiled, with a text of thanks for the Royal Air Force.

At the end of 2021, the artwork will be installed in the Tuin van Noord residential complex Parabola Blues by Madeleine Berkhemer (1973-2019) unveiled. Two staircases from the former prison form a constructivist V on a high plinth. Golden threads make the crossing between the two stairs and give the image dynamism. Parabola Blues serves as a jewel for the environment.

Since 2006, thanks to a residents' initiative, the Brancoplein has had the Table bench made by artist Jeroen Hoogstraten. The seating area is intended for passers-by and residents to enjoy the tranquility that the square exudes. The first names of residents are engraved in the edge of the tabletop, as well as the name of Branco van Dantzig after whom the square is named.

Standing on the quay MS Rottebocht 2, a linear sculpture of a ship wriggling through a river bend, created by the Rotterdam artist Cor Kraat. The motor vessel (MS) sails inland and symbolizes the former connection of the Rotte with the Nieuwe Maas. In 2019, the statue was painted blue at the request of the artist.

The Heineken company commissioned sculptor Huib Noorlander for this bronze sculpture, as a gift to the city and in memory of the old brewery. This was once a large factory site. Noorlander depicted a cheerful drinker who elegantly puts a glass to his lips.

The Amsterdam brewer Heineken opened a large brewery here in 1882 after businessman Pincoffs persuaded him to also settle in Rotterdam. In 1932, the building was expanded by architect Kromhout, with an art-deco interior inside and a plaque on the outside that depicts beer brewing, made by Willem Coenraad Brouwer. The current tenants of this national monument therefore work in a place where Freddy Heineken once held his office.

This male looks attentively at the water with his trouser legs up, because the water level in the girths can differ. They are part of a network to conduct water collection. Buro MA.AN made this man who is aware of this practical function, but with his 19th century costume also fits in this historic environment. Many wonder if it is Freddy Heineken.

Artist Susanne Kriemann had a meteorite made in a specially designed 'impact' park. She had the meteorite produced in China from photos – of a real meteorite 'The Willamette' –, curious about the Chinese copying industry and the role of photography. With the molds in China, another (illegal) copy somewhere in the world cannot be ruled out.

Buro MA.AN, which also designed the man at the beginning of the Crooswijksesingel, built a balcony at this end of the canal that marks the beginning – or end – of the Boezemsingel. Letters are raised to decorative bars, partly to be read upside down, like a reflection in the water.

The Dutch Windmill Bep van Klaveren became champion in featherweight at the Olympic Games in Amsterdam in 1928, later European champion in light middleweight. Shortly after his death in 1992, this sculpture by artist Willem Verbon was unveiled, a fighter on Olympic rings. Van Klaveren cycled past it every day on his way to the boxing school, many of which can still be found in Crooswijk.