Tina Turner Statue Unveiled in Tennessee Community Where She Grew Up

A 10-foot statue of stone n’ rotation queen Tina Turner was unveiled Saturday (Sept. 27) successful the agrarian Tennessee assemblage wherever she grew up — earlier becoming a Grammy-winning singer, an electrifying signifier performer, and 1 the world’s astir recognizable and fashionable entertainers.

The statue was revealed during a ceremonial astatine a parkland successful Brownsville, located astir an hr thrust eastbound of Memphis. The metropolis of astir 9,000 radical is adjacent Nutbush, the assemblage wherever Turner went to schoolhouse arsenic a child. As a teen, she attended precocious schoolhouse conscionable steps from wherever the statue present stands.

The statue shows Turner with her signature chaotic hairdo and holding a microphone, arsenic if she was singing connected stage. It was designed by sculptor Fred Ajanogha, who said helium tried to seizure her flexibility of question connected stage, however she held the microphone with her scale digit extended, and her hairsbreadth style, which helium compared to the “mane of a lion.”

Turner died May 24, 2023 astatine property 83 aft a agelong unwellness successful her location successful Küsnacht adjacent Zurich. Her Grammy-winning singing vocation included the deed songs “Nutbush City Limits,” “Proud Mary,” “Private Dancer,” and “We Don’t Need Another Hero,” from the movie “Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.” Her movie credits besides see Tommy and Last Action Hero.

Turner teamed with hubby Ike Turner for deed records and unrecorded shows successful the 1960s and ’70s. She survived her troubled matrimony to win successful mediate property with the chart-topping “What’s Love Got To Do With It,” released successful 1984.

Her admirers ranged from Mick Jagger to Beyoncé to Mariah Carey, and she was known arsenic the the “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll.”

The unveiling was portion of the 10th-annual Tina Turner Heritage Days, a solemnisation of her beingness increasing up successful agrarian Tennessee, earlier she moved distant arsenic a teenager. The statue was sculpted successful clay and formed successful bronze, and it took astir a twelvemonth to complete.

Karen Cook said she traveled from Georgia to be the lawsuit with her friend, a relative of Turner’s, to grant the legendary performer.

“She’s a large artist, I emotion her music,” said Cook, 59. “My ma listened to her a lot. It’s a large woody and a large happening for the assemblage to person Tina Turner successful her tiny town.”

About 50 donors gave wealth for the statue, including Ford Motor Co., which donated $150,000. Ford is gathering an electrical motortruck mill successful adjacent Stanton.

The statue stands adjacent a depository honoring Turner astatine the the West Tennessee Delta Heritage Center successful Brownsville. The depository opened successful 2014 wrong the renovated Flagg Grove School, a one-room gathering wherever Turner attended classes successful Nutbush. The schoolhouse closed successful the 1960s and was u...