Cadillac ranch, built in 1974, is the product of eccentric helium millionaire Stanley Marsh 3 (he doesn't like the Roman numeral III) and The Ant Farm, a San Francisco art collective. The ranch consists of ten graffiti-covered cars half-buried in a dusty Texas field.The cars are positioned nose-down and face west "at the same angle as the Cheops' pyramids." The cars were actually moved two miles further out in 1997 to avoid the expanding city.

Visitors are strongly encouraged and Cadillac ranch is open to the public at all hours. Graffiti on the cars is also encouraged and the cars undergo an ever mutating layer of paint. In 2005 the cars were given an all pink makeover in tribute to breast cancer victims and later painted black and yellow to honor the passing one of Marsh's longtime friends. While Marsh encourages both visitors and graffiti, he does not take kindly to visitors absconding with any of the many colorful artistic road signs that dot the area. Marsh has even been known to briefly jail thieves in a nearby chicken coop.

Cadillac ranch is thought to have been the inspiration for other, similar art pieces such as Carhenge, located in Nebraska.