A giant red ball hailed as the “world’s longest-running street art work” has rolled into Bradford as part of its UK City of Culture celebrations.
RedBall, designed by New York artist Kurt Perschke, has already visited Barcelona, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Paris, Sydney and other cities around the world, following its first appearance in St Louis, Missouri, in 2001.
The 15ft (4.6m) inflatable arrived in Keighley on Sunday, headed to Bradford on Monday and Tuesday, and is due to arrive in Ilkley later.
Bradford 2025 organisers said they were “delighted to roll out the red carpet” for its visit to seven locations around Bradford, “from Haworth to Saltaire”.
Perschke said: “It’s as tall as a lorry. It’s somewhere between a sculpture and a performance.
“I wanted something that would play with a place as opposed to being another sculpture on a corner.”
On his website, Perschke said he was inspired when asked to improve an “ugly area underneath an overpass” in St Louis as part of a US arts programme.
He said: “I was drawn to the way the concrete bridge merged into the earth and the space it created.
“RedBall came out of my thinking about that space, and how to show what I was seeing.
“After many false starts I drew this huge red sphere under the bridge, and laughed out loud.”
