Calder's Stegosaurus

Hartford, Connecticut, United States

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Public art

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Listed, not yet checked · Oct 2026

This Big Thing is recorded as still being here.

Stegosaurus is a painted steel stabile by Alexander Calder, made of 45 plates bolted together, on the Alfred E. Burr Memorial Mall in downtown Hartford, Connecticut. Commissioned as a memorial to Hartford Times founder Alfred E. Burr, it was dedicated on 10 October 1973.

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Calder's Stegosaurus

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Site-level location · 41.7632° N, 72.6740° W

FIELD GUIDE

The story

Hartford's downtown plaza is dominated by an abstract dinosaur. Alexander Calder's Stegosaurus, described by Connecticut History as a red-orange stabile representing a dinosaur from the Jurassic Period, stands on the Alfred E. Burr Memorial Mall between the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art and the Municipal Building. It was dedicated on 10 October 1973.

The sculpture is a memorial. Connecticut History records that the trustees of the Ella Burr McManus Trust Fund commissioned it in memory of her father, Alfred E. Burr, founder of the Hartford Times. Writing for Docomomo US in 2026, Priyanka Panjwani of the Wadsworth says the trustees searched for five years, considering artists including Picasso, Tony Smith and Henry Moore, before choosing Calder in 1972. The mall around it was designed by landscape architect Dan Kiley and dedicated in 1969.

Connecticut Creative Places describes 45 thin steel plates bolted together and a height of 50 feet. Panjwani gives "nearly fifty feet" and a weight of forty tons, and says the piece was shifted back from the fountain it was first meant to straddle, which shortened the span of its front legs to thirty-seven feet. She calls the colour Calder's matte orange-red.

Calder emphasised that his work had no fixed meaning, aiming, as Panjwani quotes the Hartford Times of 1973, "to create something interesting to look at." A University of Connecticut note observes that a stabile stays put while the spectator moves around it, and Panjwani says Stegosaurus is meant to be walked around, under and past. She describes the mall as a daily gathering place and a venue for festivals, performances and educational programming.

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WHAT TO EXPECT

An outdoor sculpture in an open public plaza between the Wadsworth and the Municipal Building, with lawns and trees. According to Docomomo US in 2026, it is meant to be walked around, under and past, and the mall hosts festivals, performances and educational programming.

ACCESS

On the Alfred E. Burr Memorial Mall, downtown Hartford, between Main Street and Prospect Street. It is an open public plaza reached on foot, next to the Wadsworth.

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Public art

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36 km away

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