A 17-foot sculpture made of stainless steel and recycled racing tires will soon frame the entrance to Lock 3 in downtown Akron. The twin-petaled work by internationally renowned sculptor Chakaia Booker will be installed with cranes on Monday, October 26, at the park’s Cynthia and Landon Knight Hemlock Walk, where visitors will walk through the sculpture to enter the garden.
The untitled sculpture weighs 10,000 pounds, with each of its two rubber petal sections weighing 5,000 pounds. The sections will arrive in Akron on two flatbed trucks ahead of the installation. Booker, who had a solo exhibition at the Akron Art Museum in 2000, is returning to the city for the project.
“I think it will be a really dramatic entry into the new garden” at the redeveloped Lock 3, said Annie Wischmeyer, project curator for the nonprofit Curated Storefront, which commissioned the sculpture. The work is Akron’s first major contemporary outdoor sculpture by a woman artist.
The tires in the sculpture are recycled Goodyear Racing Eagle tires, a direct nod to Akron’s identity as the Rubber City and to Goodyear’s deep roots in the community. The petal shapes frame the walkway, tying the city’s industrial past to the redesigned park’s future as a downtown gathering place.
The full project cost is $550,000, including $120,000 in installation costs shared by the city of Akron and the Ohio & Erie Canalway Coalition. The city funded $48,000 of the installation and the coalition $72,000, with additional support from individual donors, the VIA Art Fund — which contributed $100,000 — and the Moving Millions Art Catalyst Fund.
“So much of what we do is about being locally rooted and nationally relevant, and it feels like on every front, this particular sculpture commission operates on that level,” said Heather Meeker, executive director of Curated Storefront, describing the project’s support from outside Akron as well as within it.
Lock 3’s redevelopment has turned the downtown park into one of Akron’s central public spaces, and the sculpture is intended as a signature entry feature for the Hemlock Walk garden area. Once the cranes set the two petal sections in place on October 26, the work will stand as a permanent installation at the park.
Booker’s sculptures, built from discarded tires and steel, are held in museum collections and public spaces across the country. In Akron, the new piece gives downtown a landmark that is quite literally made from the material that built the city’s name.