Metaphor: The Tree of Utah
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Metaphor: The Tree of Utah is an 87 feet (26.5 m) tall sculpture that was created by the Swedish artist Karl Momen in the 1980s and dedicated in 1986. It is located in the desolate Great Salt Lake Desert of Utah on the north side of I-80 about 25 miles east of Wendover, Utah. The sculpture, which is constructed mainly of concrete, consists of a squarish 'trunk' holding up six spheres that are coated with natural rock and minerals native to Utah. There are also several hollow sphere segments on the ground around the base. The sculpture is also sometimes called the Tree of Life and was visited by the contestants on the The Amazing Race: Family Edition in 2005.
Inscribed on the plaque are the words: "A hymn to our universe whose glory and dimension is beyond all myth and imagination." It has been said that Momen was moved to create the 87 foot tall tree by the "vastness and relative emptiness" of the Bonneville Salt Flats, and that the tree "brings space, nature, myth and technology together".
