Statuary, Yard Art

Daniel Chester French (April 20, 1850 – October 7, 1931) was an American sculptor. His best-known work is the sculpture of a seated Abraham Lincoln at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. more...

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Biography

French was born deaf in Exeter, New Hampshire, to Henry Flagg French, a lawyer and Assistant US Treasury Secretary. He was a neighbor and friend of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the Alcott family. His decision to pursue sculpting was influenced by Louisa May Alcott's sister May Alcott.

After a year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, French worked on his father's farm. While visiting relatives in Brooklyn, New York City, he spent a month in the studio of John Quincy Adams Ward, then began to work on commissions, and at the age of twenty-three received from the town of Concord, Massachusetts, an order for his well-known statue The Minute Man, which was unveiled April 19, 1875 on the centenary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord.

Previously French had gone to Florence, Italy, where he spent a year working with sculptor Thomas Ball.

He is also known for his design in 1917 of the Pulitzer Prize gold medal that is presented to laureates.

In collaboration with Edward Clark Potter he modelled the George Washington statue, presented to France by the Daughters of the American Revolution; the General Grant in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, and the General Joseph Hooker statue in Boston.

In 1893, French was a founding member of the National Sculpture Society, and he became a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. French also became a member of the National Academy of Design (1901), the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the National Sculpture Society, the Architectural League, and the Accademia di San Luca, of Rome. French was one of many sculptors who frequently employed Audrey Munson as a model.

In 1940, French was selected as one of five artists to be honored in a series of postage stamps dedicated to great Americans.

French is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord, Massachusetts following his death in Stockbridge, Massachusetts in 1931 at age 81.

Chesterwood, French's summer home, studio, (designed by his architect friend and frequent collaborator Henry Bacon) and garden is now a museum.

Work

Notable public monuments

Concord Minute Man, Old North Bridge in Concord, Massachusetts, (1874); The John Harvard Monument, Harvard Yard in Cambridge, Massachusetts, (1884); Lewis Cass, National Statuary Hall, Washington D.C., (1889); Thomas Starr King monument San Francisco, California, (1891); Republic, the colossal centerpiece of the World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago, 1893. His 24-foot gilt-bronze reduced version made in 1918 survives in Chicago .; John Boyle O'Reilly Memorial, intersection of Boylston Street and Westland Avenue in Boston, Massachusetts, (1897); Rufus Choate memorial, Old Suffolk County Court House, Boston, Massachusetts, (1898); Richard Morris Hunt Memorial, on the perimeter wall of Central Park, at 5th Avenue at 70th Street, opposite the Frick Collection, in New York City, (1900); Alma Mater, campus of Columbia University in New York City (1903); Casting Bread Upon the Waters - George Robert White Memorial, Public Garden in Boston, Massachusetts; Samuel Spencer, 1st president of Southern Railway, located at Hardy Ivy Park in Atlanta, Georgia, (1909).; Standing Lincoln at the Nebraska State Capitol, Lincoln, Nebraska, (1912); Brooklyn and Manhattan, seated figures from the Manhattan Bridge; Brooklyn Museum in Brooklyn, New York, (1915); "The Spirit of Life", memorial to Spencer Trask, in Saratoga, New York at Congress Park, 1915; Samuel Francis du Pont Memorial Fountain, Wilmington, Delaware (1921).; Russell Alger Memorial Fountain, Grand Circus Park, Detroit, Michigan (1921).; Gale Park War Memorial & Park, Exeter, New Hampshire (1922); Abraham Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial (1922); Beneficence, Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. (1930); William Henry Seward Memorial in Florida, New York (1930) ; Death and the Wounded Soldier aka Death and Youth, The Chapel of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, St. Paul's School, Concord, New Hampshire; Lady Wisconsin atop the Wisconsin State Capitol building.; Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, Gallaudet University, Washington, D.C. he also sculpted the Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet statue at Gallaudet University.;

Read more at Wikipedia.org