A panel of judges that included a professional golfer, business leader, architect, foundation executive, respected artists and the Joe Louis family have selected Detroit artist Austen Brantley to sculp a new statue of sports icon Joe Louis.

The statue, commissioned jointly the Office of Arts, Culture and Entrepreneurship and the Joe Louis Greenway Planning Team, will focus on Louis’s life “outside the ring” to honor his work desegregating American golf. He was the first African American to play in a PGA-sanctioned tournament.

Louis began playing golf in 1935 and became a major supporter of the United Golf Association (UGA), the African American organization that conducted tournaments nationwide.

He soon launched “The Joe Louis Open Golf Tournament,” which would become one of the major annual events in Black sports nationally. Between 1941 and 1951, eight “Joe Louis Open” golf tournaments were held in Detroit and attracted top black golfers from around the country, while providing greater exposure for them and the sport of golf. Louis put up the $1,000 prize money. The first Joe Louis tournament was held at Detroit’s Rackham golf course in 1941 on August 12, 13 and 14, the weekend before the annual UGA national championship

The statue, which will anchor a business plaza on the city’s west side, will be another feature on the 27.5-mile Joe Louis Greenway, the biking, walking, culture and history trail that extends from the Detroit Riverfront to Highland Park, Dearborn and Hamtramck.

Artists from Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Minneapolis and Walnut, California vied with Detroit artists for the commission.

Brantley, a self-taught figurative sculptor from Detroit whose work lives at the intersection of African and Greek cultures, most recently created the sculpture of the late Lt. Col. Alexander Jefferson for Jefferson Plaza in Rouge Park. The statue, which was stolen in October was recovered brilliantly by the Detroit Police Department, has been returned to the foundry where it was forged. Brantley is going to repair and recast the bronze.

Brantley has said that his art is inspired by African and classical art, and he wants to continue the traditions of the Harlem Renaissance.

The new Joe Louis statue is scheduled to be unveiled in August 2025 on the anniversary of the first Joe Louis tournament. It is among many Detroit ACE is undertaking to increase the number of public art pieces that highlight Detroit’s rich African American history.