Giant 340-Ton Boulder Sculpture Arrives to Fanfare at L.A. Museum

100% Pure, 2005, acrylic on fired clay, 12 ? x 19 x 11 inches, Frank and Berta Gehry, ? Ken Price, photograph ? Fredrik Nilsen, courtesy of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art
100% Pure, 2005, acrylic on fired clay, 12 ½ x 19 x 11 inches, Frank and Berta Gehry, © Ken Price, photograph © Fredrik Nilsen, courtesy of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Photo: ? Ken Price, courtesy of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, LACMA /Photography ? 2011 Fredrik Nilsen, All Rights Reserved

An enormous crag of rock quarried some 60 miles away (and about twenty times larger than what’s pictured at left) arrived in Los Angeles early this morning after a circuitous eleven-day journey. The boulder-as-art, by California sculptor Michael Heizer, was so heavy — 340 tons in fact — that it required a massive 196-wheel transport. The work will be known as Levitated Mass and installed over a cut trench at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Despite the enormous cost of the project, one city council member said it would be a “big magnet” for the museum, pointing to the surprisingly large crowds that came out to see the rock parade by, even at four-thirty in the morning.

Giant 340-Ton Boulder Sculpture Arrives to Fanfare at L.A. Museum