Monumental Sculptor

Danish-American artist Gutzon Borglum and his son, Lincoln, created South Dakota’s Mount Rushmore to honor America’s leaders. Each year, nearly 300 million people visit the national monument, studying American history and marveling at the feats of creativity and engineering necessary to make this massive sculpture.    

American artist Tony Smith’s Gracehoper is an example of an abstract sculpture. Shown here installed in Detroit, the work’s massive geometric shape suggests both an oversized insect and a machine. The work’s monumental scale and flat black finish give the form an imposing tone. 

Appearing on mugs, magnets, and T-shirts, Robert Indiana’s LOVE sculpture is one of the most recognizable examples of public art today. Indiana created the work, shown here in Japan, with the idea that the word love itself could be a work of art. 

Sheep Piece by British artist Henry Moore was originally designed for display in a sheep farm in England. Moore abstracted the animals, simplifying their forms. The sculptures touch at a single point, symbolizing the relationship between mother and child. The sculpture also calls attention to the real sheep that roamed the area as part of the landscape. 

Alexander Calder’s Flamingo is located in Chicago. The bright-red, 53-foot-tall sculpture contrasts with the dark buildings around it. Viewers interact with it directly by walking under and around it. Calder juxtaposes the organic shape of the sculpture with the hard lines of the architecture nearby. 

As viewers walk between the Corten steel walls of Richard Serra’s Intersection II, the sculpture seems to change subtly. In places, the work’s gently curving walls close around the viewer; in others they open wide, allowing light to pour into the space. The viewer’s experience of this sculpture, shown here in New York, changes constantly, bringing a high level of awareness to light, space, color, and sound. 

Mark di Suvero’s Joie de Vivre is a massive sculpture located near New York City’s Wall Street. The geometric work includes a pyramidal base, which rises toward the sky. The artist invites viewers to interact with his work, allowing them to explore it by scaling the steel beams. 

Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate, located in Chicago, is one of the city’s most popular landmarks. Its mirrored surface reflects the skyline behind the viewer. Tourists and locals alike stop to take pictures of their reflected images on the side of the sculpture. 

Magdalena Abakanowicz is best known for her figurative sculptures, including Chicago’s Agora. She uses the larger-than-life size of these figures, which stand approximately 9 feet tall, to present questions about the role of the individual in society. 

Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle by Yinka Shonibare, installed in London’s Trafalgar Square in 2010, is a miniature replica of an 1805 battleship. The materials used to create the sculpture, many of which are from formerly colonized countries, represent England’s history and reference colonialism, industrialization, and trade. 

Claes Oldenburg’s Paint Torch is nearly 51 feet tall and is installed on a diagonal on a street in Philadelphia. The sculpture, which includes LED lights in the brush, looks like both a paintbrush and a torch. Oldenburg created the work to pay homage to an art school nearby, which still teaches traditional artistic methods.