Barney Bright Bares All

Louisville, Kentucky

Metal sculptor Jeptha Barnard "Barney" Bright Jr made his own tombstone, a sculpture of himself and his wife, Gayle. They are languidly reclining. And nude.

Although Gayle was only five years younger than Barney (she died in 2013), he sculpted himself as a wrinkled old man and her as a supple young woman. The nudesome-twosome might seem appropriate in an art museum -- okay, maybe not even there -- but in a graveyard they're definitely odd.

Barney was a local Louisville celebrity, and Cave Hill Cemetery is known for its welcoming policy toward graveyard art. Even so, Cave Hill supposedly rejected Barney's original tombstone design, whatever it was. We asked Michael Higgs of the Cave Hill Heritage Foundation why Barney portrayed himself this way. "I think you'd have to ask Barney Bright," Michael answered, which was his way of saying that the answer is now unknowable.

Despite its posthumous purpose, Barney's tombstone wasn't Barney's final work of art. In fact, he completed it seven years before he died in 1997. The cause of his death was lung cancer, so perhaps Barney was a smoker and knew he should plan ahead.

Barney's nude tombstone isn't his only noteworthy sculpture in Cave Hill Cemetery; he also created lifelike bronze monuments for the graves of the Flower Woman and Frito-Lay Magician. They, however, are wearing clothes.