What appears to be the first animal rights monument in Germany has been erected in the small town of Erlangen, less than 20 km (about 12 miles) from Nuremberg (in Bavaria, southwest Germany), on 29 April 2023.
On one side of the monument it says "Tiere haben Rechte" ("Animals have rights").
The monument was designed and created by sculptor Monika Ritter and is a result of effort by a local team in Erlangen that is part of a nationwide animal rights organization in Germany called "Ärzte gegen Tierversuche" (Physicians against animal experiments). This local team cooperated with the town's "office of culture". The idea was to create a monument to commemorate the suffering of non-human animals.
The monument depicts a monkey strapped into a chair-like contraption used in animal (brain) experiments (vivisection, "animal models", "in vivo studies"). It also shows a beagle dog, one of the most commonly used dog breeds in animal experiments, a pig behind bars, four rabbits, also strapped down in contraptions used in animal experiments, two guinea pigs, and one mouse.
In this way, the monument's main focus is on "animal research".
The monument is made from limestone (from Croatia) and was funded by private donations and its instalation was approved by local authorities.
Among those present at the monument's inauguration were the president (chair) of the organization "Physicians against animal experiments", Andreas Ganz, the sculptor herself (Monika Ritter), the head of the organization's local Erlangen team, Margrit Vollertsen-Diewerge, as well as Eisenhart von Loeper, an advocate for legal reforms in terms of animal welfare regulations.
You can see photos here on the "Physcians against animal experiments" website.
Also check out this monument against animal experimentation which was installed in Hamburg from 2021 to 2022. Technically, this could also be described as an animal rights monument although it did not explicitly mention animal rights.
