MIAMI — As if the mammoth amounts of paintings, sculptures, videos, performances, and works on paper on view at Art Basel Miami Beach and its satellite fairs were not enough of a visual overload, many of Miami’s major museums have also scheduled their own exhibitions to launch this week.

One of these peripheral exhibitions is “Lichtenstein at Fairchild,” opening Saturday at the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Coral Gables, the world’s largest tropical botanic garden. Ten of Roy Lichtenstein’s large-scale sculptures, dating from between 1974 and 1997, and including one recovered from the rubble of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, are installed throughout a portion of the Fairchild’s 83 sprawling acres, marking the first exhibition of his sculptures in an outdoor, naturalistic setting.

The piece that once sat in Battery Park City, “Modern Head” (1974/89), was first produced as an edition of three in brushed aluminum, and a fourth edition of this hard-edge art deco-spoofing sculpture was re-cast in 1989 in a shocking electric blue. In the mid-’90s, this newly minted piece made its way to the sculpture gardens in Battery Park City, where it resided until September 11. It survived the events of that day with only minor scratches, and its top was even used by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to post messages during the recovery process. After four months, “Modern Head” was removed from its Battery Park home for repairs, and eventually found residence in upstate New York.

Here at Fairchild, “Modern Head” stands on an overlook with long views out onto the expansive garden’s property. Its neo-futurist silhouette cuts sharp angles against the sky, contrasting against the softness of clouds. Openings cut out for jowls, neck, eyes, and hair lead the gaze up into the vastness of sky, lending this otherwise ignorable sculpture the quality of some ancient, powerful totem.

Indeed, it’s Fairchild’s setting that makes the sculptures come alive. Ordinarily, Lichtenstein’s work — and especially his sculpture — is too ironic for its own good, representing the dead-end strain of Pop Art’s mocking, sarcastic, and vacant mirroring of contemporary culture. Like Warhol or even Johns, Lichtenstein’s work is intelligent, deceptively so; but, unlike those two artists, the result is just too dependent on the superficial joy of a quick read and art-world puns. But at the Fairchild and, in truth, precisely because of the Fairchild, Lichtenstein’s large metal sculptures are miraculously transformed into fun, snappy alien anachronisms set against an impossibly lush backdrop that includes butterfly gardens, vibrant succulents, and dry forest plants from Madagascar.

The joy of this exhibition comes first from spotting the primary reds, blues, and yellows of Lichtenstein’s sculptures as they peek through the gardens. Once in full view, the bright, seemingly unnatural color of the sculpture sets in motion an arresting process whereby the eye begins to register the far more unnatural-seeming colors to be found in the plants and trees of the gardens. The whole experience becomes one of metaphoric transposition, where the sculptures read less as icons of Pop Art and more as pathways to an expanded appreciation of nature’s own quirky works.

And it’s transformative. The spiny, anemone-like cacti with translucent hues of dusty green are no stranger than Lichtenstein’s rocket-propelled “Lamp” (1978), a sculpture of a lampshade suspended in the air by the lines of its cast shadow. “Galatea” (1990), “Airplane” (1990), and “Endless Drip” (1995) each form strong verticals, mimicking the surrounding palm trees, while the firing guns of “Airplane” or the yellow shock of hair on top of “Galatea” perfectly reference any number of brightly colored flowering plants nearby. Encountering the large, cartoonish “Brushstrokes” (1996) — a tall sculpture composed of exactly what the title suggests, stylized brushstrokes — does not seem out of place at all when compared to the Victoria water lily, which can grow up to 7 feet in diameter. The somewhat cantilevered brushstrokes composing the sculpture begin to serve as sight lines to the multitude of plantings just beyond.