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DEACON CHAPIN, BY SAINT GAUDENS

At Springfield, Massachusetts.

Indeed, in reviewing the life of this great artist, one asks what other sculptor of modern times has produced such a succession of notable achievements as the “Farragut”; the “Lincoln” of Chicago; the “Deacon Chapin” of Springfield, Massachusetts; the “Adams Memorial” in Washington; the “Shaw Memorial”; the “Logan”; the “Sherman”, and finally the seated “Lincoln.” Add to this the countless exquisite medallions, the delightfully decorative high relief portraits, and, perhaps most beautiful of all, that angelic brood of which the “Amor Caritas” is the type and culmination, and where shall we look for a more individual expression? Rodin himself, with all his contortions, has not produced so much beauty nor demonstrated himself more “original.”

Copyright, 1905, by De W. C. Ward.

AUGUSTUS SAINT GAUDENS IN HIS STUDIO

From a painting by Kenyon Cox.

To different moods these great works make their differing appeals. The heroic “Lincoln,” with its strong, gaunt frame and its majestic head bowed in sympathetic tenderness; the sturdy “Chapin,” wrapped in a voluminous cloak and self sufficiency; the mysterious, inscrutable genius of the Adams tomb; the rhythmic momentum of the colored regiment with its fated leader riding serenely, square shouldered, and level eyed to his doom; the glorious “Victory” of the Sherman group, the most spiritual, most ethereal of all sculptured types,—what an array are these! What wealth to have brought to our national ideals!

DANIEL CHESTER FRENCH

BIRTHPLACE OF G. G. BARNARD

Barnard was born at Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, where his parents were temporarily residing in 1863. The sculptor is really a Westerner.

Worthy successor to the great artist who put us all under such heavy obligations is Daniel Chester French, whose work is known throughout the land. French was born at Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1850, and grew up in Concord, Massachusetts, amid ideal surroundings. His first youthful effort in sculpture, “The Minute Man of Concord,” was a success, and his busy life has known no failures. No other American sculptor has produced so much, and we can name here but a few of his most important works.

MINUTE MAN, BY FRENCH

At Concord, Massachusetts.

Reproduced from American Sculpture, by Lorado Taft. Copyright, 1903, by The MacMillan Co.

ALMA MATER, BY FRENCH

Adorning the approach to the Library of Columbia University, New York City.

DANIEL CHESTER FRENCH

French is well known as a sculptor in both America and Europe.

Best beloved is the noble “Death and the Young Sculptor,” designed as a memorial to the sculptor, Martin Milmore. In this poetic group we have unquestionably one of the highest expressions of a purely American art. Other works of interest are the ascetic “John Harvard” of Cambridge; a vigorous “General Cass” and the touchingly sympathetic “Gallaudet” group, both in Washington, D. C.; the “O’Reilly” monument of Boston; the equestrian “Washington” in Paris and Chicago; “General Grant” in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia; and “General Hooker” in Boston. Among his most recent works are a “Lincoln” for Lincoln, Nebraska, and an “Emerson” for Concord.

The Columbian Exposition was crowned by French’s gigantic and truly monumental “Republic,” a superb figure which reappears, comfortably seated for all time, in the “Alma Mater” of Columbia. French does not disdain architectural sculpture, and has made beautiful groups for the Custom House of New York, the postoffice of Cleveland, and the pediment of the Brooklyn Institute. In the recent Parkman and Melvin memorials he has shown a treatment peculiarly adapted to the stone, a most valuable suggestion to our younger men. No one has greater influence upon the trend of American sculpture than has French, and many there are who owe to him their successful beginnings.

FREDERICK MacMONNIES

FREDERICK WILLIAM MacMONNIES

HORSE TAMERS, BY MacMONNIES

Two groups, one of which is shown, that adorn an entrance to Prospect Park, Brooklyn. They formed part of the sculptor’s remarkable exhibit at the Paris Exposition of 1900.

When in 1884 Frederick MacMonnies arrived in Paris he was equipped as no American had ever been before. He was twenty-one years old, and had already spent five years in the studio of Saint Gaudens, besides learning to draw like a skilled painter. His progress was proportionate, and it has been his joy ever since to meet his European competitors upon their own field and to rival them in whatever they undertake. If there is nothing distinctively American in his art, it is sculpture of the highest degree of workmanship, an international coin that passes current wherever good art is known.

BIRTHPLACE OF D. C. FRENCH

French was born in Exeter, New Hampshire, on April 20, 1850

THE HEWER, BY BARNARD

The plate on the pedestal says, “Erected in memory of William Parker Halliday, and presented to the city of Cairo, Ill., A. D. 1906, in token of his unswerving faith in her destiny.”

No one has ever worked quite so feverishly as did MacMonnies during those wonderful first years of his career, and no one has ever done so much in the time. The list is too long even to chronicle here, much less to comment upon. Beginning with the “Nathan Hale” and “Stranahan” of the Salon of 1891, the sculptor came insistently into national view in 1893 with his great Columbian fountain, the jewel of the Chicago Exposition. It was the opportunity of a lifetime, and the young sculptor rose serenely and triumphantly to the occasion. The memory of that exquisite twilight vision remains a delight to all who saw it. Orders followed in rapid sequence, and brought more successes,—the archaistic “Shakespeare” of the Congressional Library; the irresistible “Bacchante”; “Sir Henry Vane” of Boston; and the