Roll out the barrels: Christo artwork floats on London lake

LONDON - The ducks, geese and hardy cold-water swimmers in London's Hyde Park have a new neighbour: a monumental floating structure made from 7,506 stacked barrels colored bright red, mauve and blue.

"The London Mastaba" is the latest work by artist Christo, who has previously wrapped Berlin's Reichstag in silver fabric and festooned New York's Central Park with thousands of saffron-colored cloth "gates."

His first major work in London rises 65 feet (20 metres) above the park's Serpentine lake, in a sloping-sided rectangular shape adapted from ancient Egyptian tombs. The colours have been chosen to complement the lush greenery and grey-blue skies of a London summer.

The sculpture, on display from Monday until Sept. 23, is one in a series of barrel-based artworks Christo has created since the 1950s.

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