Huge Robot Sculpture Ready For Tulsa's Center Of The Universe Festival

A Denver artist brought his huge robot sculpture to the Brady Arts District for the Center of the Universe Festival.

Robot Resurrection is 28 feet tall and made mostly of recycled airplane parts. It shoots fire from its hands and is fully articulated, according to its creator.

Shane Evans, 44, braved the intense heat Friday morning to assemble the contraption on Cameron Street right in front of News On 6.

Evans said he built the sculpture about a year and a half ago so he could take it to Burning Man, the giant arts festival held in the Nevada desert every year.

"There's such large art out there and I wanted to be in that arena and challenge myself," he said. So he got to work.

7/22/2015: Related Story: Hydrated And Happy Is Focus Of Center Of The Universe Festival Organizers

He found a source of cheap airplane parts at an aircraft boneyard in Colorado. A friend helped him with the robot's electronics while other friends helped him with some of the construction, but most of the work is his, which he said was seven months of 12- to 14-hour days.

He took Robot Resurrection to Burning Man and has since crossed the country numerous times with it, appearing at eight events last year.

Visit Robot Resurrection's Facebook page.

"I've just always kind of been making stuff, tinkering with stuff," he explained. He's created many sculptures since his mid 20s and even built art for the two bars he owned over the years, but the robot is by far the biggest work he's ever constructed.

Someone from Tulsa saw the robot at a Florida festival called Love Burn and contacted him about the Center of the Universe Festival. 

Built without plans, Robot Resurrection is assembled on a trailer lying on its back. Evans then uses a winch in his box truck to stand it upright. With a ladder he takes with him, he climbs into the center of the robot to activate its controls, which include changing its lights, moving its arms and hands as well as shooting fire.

Evans says with a shrug he has between $25,000 and $30,000 invested in the sculpture.

"I kind of got lost there for a while. It took ME over," he said with a grin.

After Tulsa his next trip will be to San Diego, then a stop in Macon, Georgia.