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Gracehoper is a 13-ton black painted steel sculpture by Tony Smith on the Overlook at Louisville's Waterfront Park. Measuring 23 by 22 by 46 feet, it was dedicated by the Humana Foundation in 1989 and has been on loan to the park from the Kentucky Center since 1999.
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Gracehoper (Tony Smith, Waterfront Park)
This pin marks the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.
Site-level location · 38.2637° N, 85.7469° W
FIELD GUIDE
The story
A thirteen-ton black steel sculpture crouches on the Overlook above the Ohio River at Louisville's Waterfront Park, and it began life somewhere else entirely.
Gracehoper is by the American sculptor Tony Smith. Waterfront Park describes it as black painted steel measuring 23 by 22 by 46 feet, and the Kentucky Center's collection page gives its weight as thirteen tons. In 1989 the Humana Foundation dedicated it as a gift in appreciation of Wendell Cherry, the first chairman of the board of the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts. According to a 2012 account by the conservation network VoCA, it was originally commissioned for the plaza of the Kentucky Center in downtown Louisville and was later relocated to a more open site along the river. It has been on loan to Waterfront Park from the Kentucky Center's art collection since 1999.
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WHAT TO EXPECT
A large black steel sculpture on the Overlook in Waterfront Park, a public riverside park. The park's Overlook was restored in a project the park reported complete in January 2025.
ACCESS
The Overlook, Waterfront Park, Louisville, Kentucky. It stands in a public park and is on loan from the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts to the park's operator.
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