Aluminum Yucca 22-foot F-16 fuel tank sculpture

Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States

Public art

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Listed, not yet checked · Oct 2026

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Aluminum Yucca is a 22-foot sculpture by California artist Gordon Huether, installed in 2003 at the far east Central Avenue gateway to Albuquerque on I-40 in Tijeras Canyon. Its leaves are cut from salvaged aluminium F-16 fuel tanks, shaped to resemble a Datil yucca.

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Aluminum Yucca 22-foot F-16 fuel tank sculpture

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Site-level location · 35.0844° N, 106.4936° W

FIELD GUIDE

The story

A cluster of polished aluminium leaves, 22 feet high, marks the eastern gateway to Albuquerque, where Interstate 40 and the old Route 66 come down through Tijeras Canyon. Aluminum Yucca was designed and installed by California artist Gordon Huether in 2003; his website gives its size as 22 feet high by 15 feet wide and 15 feet deep.

The leaves are salvaged hollow aluminium fuel tanks from F-16 military aircraft, sliced vertically to resemble the scooped shape of the Datil yucca, a plant native to the area. According to the artist's website, a slow-moving, solar-powered colour wheel lights the sculpture at night in hues that recreate the Albuquerque desert landscape. Route 66 News, summarising a 2013 Albuquerque Journal report, said that Huether's inspiration was twofold: the area's ties to Kirtland Air Force Base, and the yucca, New Mexico's state flower, in whose form he finds "inherent dramatic gestures". His website adds that the exaggerated scale celebrates the "romance and nostalgia of western Road Culture in the 20th century", pointing to wigwam-shaped hotels, five-foot Mexican sombreros and giant cowboy boots along Route 66.

Route 66 News, summarising an Albuquerque Journal report from 2013, the sculpture's tenth year, gave its cost as $124,000, paid for with grants from the U.S. Department of Transportation, the City of Albuquerque and the State of New Mexico. The same report said it was meant to be one element of a larger East Mountain gateway project, including a visitors' centre with nods to Route 66, Kirtland Air Force Base and Sandia National Laboratories, and that, as of then, nothing else from that plan had been built.

Visit Albuquerque's Route 66 centennial public-art itinerary lists the sculpture among the city's Route 66 artworks. It stands in the interstate corridor rather than in a park, and the City of Albuquerque's public art handout says simply: "Look for this one on the road."

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WHAT TO EXPECT

A large sculpture in the I-40 corridor in Tijeras Canyon, listed by Visit Albuquerque among its Route 66 public artworks. According to the artist's website it is lit at night by a solar-powered colour wheel. There are no facilities or exhibits; it is a sculpture to see.

ACCESS

On I-40 in Tijeras Canyon, at the far east Central Avenue gateway to Albuquerque on the Route 66 approach. It stands in the highway corridor; the City of Albuquerque's public art handout says to look for it on the road.

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