Untitled

Abstract artist Ellsworth Kelly created *Untitled* in 1986. It arrived here in 2018 on loan from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, DC. The sculpture is part of Kelly’s “rocker” series, and its origin story is one of humble beginnings. One day Kelly took a plastic coffee lid from his local deli, cut out a flat section, folded it in half, and rocked it back and forth on a table. It was a eureka moment that paved the way for *Untitled*, a sculpture that plays with depth and dimension, thanks to its rounded edges that contrast the extreme flatness of its surface. Constructed from concrete and steel, *Untitled* weighs several thousand pounds. And as a result of *Untitled’s* bulk and heft, the Museum had quite the lift to get the sculpture into the courtyard. A crane hoisted *Untitled* up from a flatbed and down over the trees to a team waiting to position it over its bed of mulch. The effort required constant communication among the truck driver, the crane operator, and people on the ground. Once the sculpture was maneuvered into the correct position, mere inches above the ground, it was dropped into place, and additional mulch was added. The effort was a testament to how something as small and seemingly insignificant as a coffee lid can inspire larger-than-life art.