Call him Ishmael.

He is the soldered, crestfallen, metallic man who sits on a wooden floor inside the open black cage. Nestled outside Steely Library across from Landrum Academic Center, he crouches as though trapped, even though his shackles and his door are unlocked, and there is no roof to the enclosure.

That represents the spirit of the piece. Named “Ishmael’s Cage,” it was sculpted by Dan Collett, a Northern Kentucky University alumnus. Collett said in a Cincinnati Enquirer article that people become burdened because they let their problems encumber them.

“That’s what’s holding him down