Composed of the elements of sand, iron, and water, the work Übermenschlich: Diestiaan consists of two in appearance identically shaped stones.

The ocher, rust-colored objects lie as a pair, side by side, on the ground, in direct relation to their surrounding, centrally located on the domain of Horst castle.

Not visible on the surface Übermenschlich: Diestiaan’s two components derive from a different process of formation. Artist Lodewijk Heylen (Hulshout, 1989) created an artificially produced duplicate of a natural ironstone that is found in the Hageland region, called Diestiaan.

The now scarce ironstone was extracted out of the soil mainly between 1850 and World War II. The high demand for this building material unleashed a veritable industry that until the exhaustion of the quarries, in the early 1980s, fell into disrepair. 

Marking the natural environment of the Hageland profoundly, the regional industry simultaneously shaped the urban landscape of this area. 

Übermenschlich: Diestiaan is a site-specific work that refers to the industrial and cultural heritage of Horst (Municipality Holsbeek, region Hageland). With this work Heylen exposes the industrial manufactured world, exploring the idea of the feasible earth.