Some of you may have stumbled upon a giant blue head on a crane at 9th and F Streets on your coffee run this morning. That 31 foot tall, 13,000 pound sculpture is the work of Roy Lichtenstein, the renowned American pop artist who died in 1997. Known for his bright, bold colors and old-school comic book stylings, Lichtenstein already has work all over D.C.; in fact, the National Gallery of Art has the largest repository of his work, after he gifted a slew of his prints in 1996. You can also see a couple of his works at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and the Sackler Gallery.

As for this bright blue piece, Modern Head was installed this morning at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. The sculpture comes to us from New York, where it sat near the World Trade Center buildings during September 11, 2001 (it took a few scratches, but otherwise survived intact), where we're told it acted as a message board by the FBI during their initial investigation.

SAAM's blog Eye Level tells us more:

Made of steel and painted an electrifying blue, Modern Head was conceived by the artist in 1974, but fabricated about fifteen years later. It was part of a series Lichtenstein began in the 1960s in which human figures are deliberately made to resemble machines. Looking at Modern Head one can see the abstract geometric forms, precision, and flat planes associated with Art Deco architecture of the 1930s.

DCist photographer Meaghan Gay made it over to see the installation this morning, in a concrete slab poured specifically for the statue. Modern Head is outside the Reynolds Center, directly across from the Spy Museum, so walk by anytime to check out SAAM's colorful new addition.

(Meaghan Gay)

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