Ghost Ballet for East Bank Machineworks

The story

Standing on the East Bank of the Cumberland River near Nissan Stadium, Ghost Ballet for East Bank Machineworks looks less like traditional public art and more like an industrial crane that had a fever dream. Built right on the structural remains of an old riverfront gantry crane, the 100-foot-tall structure wraps red-painted steel trusses around a central frame, grounding itself in a swirling, turbine-like helix at the base. It’s a deliberate monument to the river’s working-class past, frozen mid-twisting motion.

Designed by sculptor Alice Aycock and installed between 2007 and 2008, the piece carried a price tag of roughly $500,000, making it Nashville's most expensive public art investment at the time. Aycock engineered the geometry so that it refuses to settle into a single visual identity. Look at it from lower Broadway, from the pedestrian bridge, or standing directly underneath it, and the red trusses reassemble themselves into entirely different shapes from every angle.

At night, the heavy industrial framing softens into something much stranger. Neon fixtures tucked deep inside the core light up, casting a red glow through the deconstructed steel. You didn't hear it from us, but skipping the view from across the river and actually walking up to its base after dark gives you a far weirder sense of scale than anything you'll catch from a car window.