Content provided in partnership with

Daniel Chester French and the sculpture of Augustus Saint-Gaudens - New York Metropolitan Museum

Magazine Antiques, Jan, 2000 by Thayer Tolles

In 1905, two years before the death of Augustus Saint-Gaudens, the Metropolitan Museum of Art possessed only one minor work by the country's most gifted sculptor. This was the George Washington inaugural centennial medal of 1889, two examples of which were donated to the museum m 1890 by Henry G. Marquand (1819-1902), then the president of the museum. [1] The early absence of Saint-Gaudens's sculpture in the collection may be attributed to the museum's late nineteenth-century policy of furthering the acquisition of works by living artists through gift rather than purchase. It was certainly not for lack of contact between the museum and Saint-Gaudens.

Most Popular Articles in Home & Garden: Coolest room on the block: have a bedroom that's way drab and boring? Hang ...; Reuse, recycle, remodel: environmentally friendly materials and techniques ...; Keeping it simple: interior designer Michael Lee finds an overdesigned ...; House of the Year: this craftsman-inspired home is factory-built--proving ...; Dreaming of cabin life: smart ideas for small spaces, plus the hottest spots ...; More »

The sculptor expressed an unwavering interest in the well-being of the museum during its rise to eminence m the 1880s and 1890s, which paralleled his own. His work was displayed in the museums building in Central Park as early as 1882, when a plaster bas-relief portrait of Sarah Redwood Lee (b. 1865) was on loan in the modem sculpture gallery. Four years later, when the annual exhibition of the Society of American Artists was held in the museum, Saint-Gaudens's bornze The Children of Jacob H. Schiff (see PI. V) received critical praise. [2] Between 1891 mid 1895 the sculptor served on a special museum committee to raise funds with which to acquire a collection of plaster casts after antique and Renaissance sculptures. He was one of several gentlemen to donate two American paintings to the museum in 1892 and 1893. These were, respectively, The Rain of 1889 by William Anderson Coffin (1855-1925) mid Eleanor Hardy Banker of about 1890 by Dennis Miller Bunker (1861- 1890). [3] Saint-Gaudens likened the Great Hall, designed by Richard Morris Hunt (1827-1895) and completed in 1902, to the Baths of Caracalla in Rome, although in his characteristically forthright manner he declared it an unfortunate space for the display of sculpture, which was its primary purpose at the time. [4]

In keeping with its early policy, the museum did not buy its first American sculpture until 1905, and its holdings grew slowly and unevenly, reflecting the taste of wealthy collectors who donated neoclassical marbles by such sculptors as Hiram Powers (1805- 1873), Thomas Crawford (1813?- 1857), and William Wetmore Story (1819-1895). This approach was only modified after 1903, when the sculptor Daniel Chester French (Fig. 3) was elected a trustee and the chairman of the trustees' committee on sculpture. Commanding uniform respect from artists, collectors, and fellow trustees, French was ideally suited to the task of developing the sculpture collection. Until his death twenty-eight years later he was the de facto curator of sculpture, building the museums core group of beaux-arts bronzes. His systematic program was earned out in response to an initiative by the trustees to acquire the work of living American artists-a course heartily endorsed by Sir Caspar Purdon Clarke (1846-1911), who was director from 1905 to 1910, and his successor, Edward Robinson (1858-1931), director from 1910 to 1931. Furthermore, the availability of an unexpected five million-dollar bequest following the death in 1901 of Jacob S. Rogers, head of the Rogers Locomotive Works in Paterson, New Jersey, enabled the museum to justify the purchase of American sculpture in quantity. Some eighty-five sculptures by artists born before 1885 were acquired through the Rogers fund, the majority between 1906 and 1912.

French moved quickly to assemble "a collection of bronzes... which shall illustrate the modem development of this art, especially in the United States." [5] In the course of acquiring representative examples by sculptors at the peak of their powers such as Gutzon Borglum (1867-1941), Frederic Remington (1861-1902), and Bessie Potter Vonnoh (1872--1955), French visited studios and galleries, negotiated with artists and foundries, and presented proposals to the trustees' committee on purchases. His greatest energies were reserved for his genial competitor, Saint-Gaudens, whose work he first began to acquire for the museum in 1905. With Saint-Gaudens making the selection, the museum commissioned marble versions of three of his early bronze bas-reliefs. Saint-Gaudens said he would "supervise and finish...with his own hands, in marble, under most generous and favorable conditions, several of his famous reliefs of children." [6]

French appealed successfully to the New York City financier and philanthropist Jacob H. Schiff (1847-1920) to fund the replication in marble of The Children of Prescott Hall Butler of 1880-1881, Homer Schiff Saint-Gaudens of 1881-1882, and The Children of Jacob H. Schiff (P1. V). The work was executed by the Piccirilli Brothers, the leading firm of carvers in New York City. Saint-Gaudens died of cancer in August 1907 before he could fulfill his promise of putting the finishing touches on the marbles, a task that was completed by his trusted assistant Frances Grimes (1869-1963). The essence of Saint-Gaudens's genius is captured in these poignant perceptions of childhood. The Butler and Schiff children are united compositionally and emotionally through the skillful overlapping of the figures, while the portrait of Homer Saint-Gaudens is a tangible expression of the love the father felt for his son. The museum was fortunate to purchase from the artist only months before his death Head of Victory (P1. I), which is related to the sculptor's Sherman Monument of 1892-1903 in the Grand Army Plaza in New York City. Saint-Gaudens's constant dedication to all stages of making a sculpture, from modeling in clay to surface patination, is embodied in the beautiful cast of Victory. French informed the Gorham Manufacturing Company, which made the cast of the head, that Saint-Gaudens "desires to pay special attention to the patine of the one which is to be exhibited at the Museum." [7]

Daniel Chester French and the sculpture of Augustus Saint-Gaudens - New York Metropolitan Museum

Magazine Antiques, Jan, 2000 by Thayer Tolles

Find Research Guides for:

Find Featured Titles for: Sports

Most Popular Articles in Home & Garden

Most Popular Publications in Home & Garden