Augustus
Saint-Gaudens
American
sculpture (1848-1907)
Jpg:
Augustus
Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907)
is one of America's greatest sculptures, a teacher, a prominent member
of the City Beautiful movement, and he helped define the Gilded ages by
adorning with relief sculptures the colossal homes of the Nouveau
riche.
Augustus
Saint-Gaudens was born March
1, 1848 in Dublin, Ireland but immigrated to New York City six months
later
where he grew up. Completing school at age thirteen, he apprenticed to
a cameo cutter and took art classes at the Cooper Union and the
National
Academy of Design.
At 19 (1867), he
traveled to Paris
where he studied under Francois Jouffry at the renown Ecole
des Beaux-Arts. In 1870, he left Paris for Rome and studied
classical
art and architecture for five years, and worked on his first
commissions,
met his wife -- an American art student (Augusta Homer) and they were
married
in 1877.
The following year
'78, he's back
in Paris for the world Exposition and served on the jury for American
artists
with Francis
D. Millet. Also in town was Charles
McKim and he might have met John Singer Sargent who was studying in
Paris during this time. After the Exposition Saint-Gaudens and McKim
traveled
to the south of France to study architecture which would cement their
ideas
of Beaux-Arts Classicism (after the French Ecole des Beaux-Arts).
In 1876 he received
his first major
commission; a monument to Civil War Admiral David Glasgow Farragut.
Unveiled
in New York's Madison Square in 1881, the monument was a tremendous
success;
its combination of realism and allegory, a departure from previous
American
sculpture. Saint-Gaudens' fame grew, and other commissions were quickly
forthcoming.
Saint-Gaudens'
increased prominence
allowed him to pursue his strong interest in teaching, something he did
steadily from 1888 to 1897. He tutored young artists privately, taught
at the Art Students League, and took on a large number of
assistants.
He was involved
with the men of the
City Beautiful movement -- artistic advisor to the Columbian
Exposition of 1893, an avid supporter of the American Academy in
Rome,
and served on the MacMillan Commission, which made recommendations for
the architectural and artistic preservation and improvement of the
Nation's
Capital.
He produced
distinctive public sculptures.
A nymph "Diana of the Tower"
set atop Stanford White's Madison Square Gardens -- since razed, but
smaller
version remain as one of THE icons of the period. He produced
beautiful
memorials such as the Adams Memorial, the Peter Cooper
Monument,
and the John A. Logan Monument. Perhaps his greatest
achievement
during this period, was the Shaw Memorial unveiled on Boston
Common
in 1897. Described as Saint-Gaudens' "symphony in bronze," this
masterpiece
took fourteen years to complete.
Diagnosed with
cancer in 1900, he
decided to live in Cornish year round. For the next seven years,
despite
diminishing energy, he continued to work, producing a steady stream of
reliefs and public sculpture.
Saint-Gaudens died
in Cornish on
August 3, 1907. His wife survived him for nineteen years, and continued
to summer at Aspet. In 1919, she and their son, Homer, established the
Saint-Gaudens Memorial, an organization dedicated to preserve the place
as an historic site. In 1965, the Memorial donated the property to the
National Park Service and their website online is fabulous for more
information
on Augustus
Saint-Gaudens.
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