Willie Cole had 100 leftover saxophones from his Kansas City airport art, so he kept building

Cole’s installation — titled “Ornithology” after Charlie Parker’s 1946 tune — consists of 12 birds made entirely from alto saxophones which suspend from the ceiling of Concourse B inside the new KCI terminal. But Cole keeps returning to Kansas City to work on more saxophone sculptures.
Willie Cole didn’t choose to be an artist. It’s always been part of him.

“I think I was an artist in a previous life,” said the contemporary American sculptor, printer and perceptual engineer. “When I was 3 years old, my mom found me drawing in the kitchen, and since then, my family always said I was an artist. I went along with it. I enjoyed it.”

Cole’s art work has been showcased across the United States in such museums and institutes as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Montclair Art Museum, the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University and most recently, the new terminal at Kansas City International Airport.