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Rien Monshouwer has left a number of remarkable traces behind in the public space. Some of these are permanent, others temporary. The thread running through the artist's artistic interventions is his research into the effect of words, colours, meanings and forms on the environment in which they occur. He reports his findings in the form of sculptures, paintings and installations. These include both site-specific interventions and visual art that is not tied to a specific location.

In 1996, in the library of the new city hall in The Hague, Monshouwer realized an installation in the form of a (library) ladder placed against a wall. Photographs of private bookcases have been affixed to this wall. With his sculpture for the Sculpture Gallery, Monshouwer is following a different path. With this plinth sculpture, he makes the relationship between word and image visible. The artist plays with the differences between word images and image signs. He transforms words into images. This literally gives shape to the concept of 'visual language'. But the artist goes a step further. His 'word picture' is a monument to language and at the same time the bronze building manifests itself as an open architectonic construction.

Monshouwer deliberately chose a rigid design. The open construction of the stacked letters B - E - L - D has created a kind of tower or column that keeps changing in appearance from different angles. From certain angles, the word has even become such an image that it can no longer be recognised.