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Women Sculptors at the 1893 Exposition
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Sarah Bernhardt
Harriet Hosmer
Vinnie Ream Hoxie
Adelaide Johnson
Mary T. Lawrence (Tonetti)
Edmonia Lewis
Evelyn B. Longman
Carol Brooks MacNeill
Adelaide Manan
Helen F. Mears
Jean Pond Miner (Coburn)
Blanche Nevin
Elisabet Ney
Theodora Alice Ruggles
Janet Scudder
Luella Varney (Serrao)
Bessie Potter Vonnoh
Julia Bracken Wendt
Anne Whitney
Enid Bland Yandell
Sarah Bernhardt (1844 - 1923)
A Portrait Bust of an Actress (c.1885-1895)--
good example of her work.
Three works -- Ophelia (bas relief),
bust of child,
and bust of Louise Abbema (French artist) --
exhibited in Women's Building, 1893 Exposition.
One of the most famous actresses of the Nineteenth Century,
Sarah Bernhardt (born Henriette-Rosine Bernard) was born
in Paris of French-Dutch-Jewish heritage. One of her famous roles was
Camille in La Dame aux Cam�lias by the younger
Alexandre Dumas, but she was also known to don "breeches" and play males roles
like Hamlet. Oscar Wilde named her "The Divine
Sarah" and wrote his play Salome for her. Berhnardt was also an accomplished sculptor who exhibited her
work regularly in Paris, London, and New York from the 1870s to about 1900.
Her often highly imaginative,
sculptured self-portraits include the foot-tall
symbolist-grotesque "Inkwell, Self-Portrait as a
Sphinx" (1880). Her autobiography, Memories of My Life,
was published in 1907.
Biography
Sarah Bernhardt Pages--information on Bernhardt as actress.
Sculptured Self-portraits--4 images
In Praise of Women--scroll down to "Sculpture by Sarah
Bernhardt"
Life's
Vanity (1880-1900)--example of Bernhardt's painting
Harriet Hosmer (1830 - 1908)
Daphne--representative work
Puck--representative work Putti--representative work
Sleeping Faun--representative work
Hosmer on stepladder next to
her Senator Hart sculpture.
Queen Isabella 1893
[my
scan]--
LARGE IMAGE HERE.
Exhibited in the California Building, 1893 Exposition
Click here to see Queen Isabella on display
(at end of the hall) in the Palace of Fine Arts at
the 1894 California Midwinter International Exposition
Harriet Hosmer was probably the most well-known and successful
woman sculptor of the Nineteenth Century. Born in Massachusetts,
she went to study in 1852 in Rome where she remained for most of
her adult life as the leader of a group of American women
artists. Hawthorne immortalized her as Hilda in his Italian novel
The Marble Faun, and Robert and Elizabeth Barrett
Browning became her good friends. Her neo-classical statue of
Queen Isabella of Spain was commissioned for the 1893 World
Fair by a group of activist women, known as as the Chicago Isabellas, who believed the Queen deserved as much recognition as
did Columbus whose "discovery" of America was being
honored at the Fair. A bronze replica of Queen Isabella was sold
to the Pope. The plaster model, which was sent the following year to San
Francisco for display, disappeared, but no one seems to know how,
where, or when.
Biography
Harriet Goodhue Hosmer--biography
and two images available
Biography/photo
Expatriate Sculptor Harriet Hosmer--her career and lifestyle
1894 Midwinter Fair: Women Artists--read the story of the controversy over Hosmer's Queen
Isabella statue.
Harriet Hosmer--This source says Isabella was
commissioned by San Francisco City and exhibited 1894.
Zenobia--image; full-length Zenobia--image.
Oenone--image.
Beatrice Cenci--excellent image. Beatrice Cenci--scroll down to excellent image
Sleeping Faun --click on image to enlarge it; Waking Faun.
Two images--click on Medusa
and Sleeping Faun; excellent Medusa here
Three images-- Puck; Sleeping Faun; Will o' the Wisp
Puck--image (alternate source
here); Puck and Owl--image
4 bas reliefs--images; Night Rises with the Stars--image
Night rises with the
stars --bas relief;
Falling stars --bas relief
19th Century Slides--scroll down to ten images of statues by
Hosmer
Vinnie Ream Hoxie (1847 - 1914 )
The West 1893--exhibited in |
America 1893-- |
 Sappho--excellent example of her work. |
 Abraham Lincoln--example of her work. |
Born in a frontier town in
Wisconsin, the largely self-taught sculptor Vinnie
Ream Hoxie was the talk
of Washington, D.C. when, at age 19, she became the first woman
and youngest artist to ever receive a commission from the United
Stated Government for a statue. That statue of Abraham Lincoln
stands today in the U. S. Capitol Rotunda. She also received
other major government commissions for statues of American heroes
and male dignitaries, but at the 1893 World Fair, her female
statues (shown above) resembled more the beauty and dignity of
her Sappho statue which resides today on her
tombstone.
Biography
Biography/5 images--find out why else she was the talk of
the town.
Artworks by Vinnie Ream--9 images
Vinnie Ream Hoxie-- Two images included.
Vinnie Ream Hoxie at Iowa and Elsewhere--more on her career and social life
Vinnie Ream--short biography; 2 excellent images of her
important D.C. statues
Lincoln and Sappho--images; another Lincoln--image
Governor Kirkwood--image/commentary; another Governor Kirwood--image; another Gov. Kirkwood
Sequoyah--image/commentary; another Sequoyah--image; another Sequoya
Adelaide (Sarah Adeline)
Johnson (1859 - 1955)
Bust of Susan B. Anthony 1893--
exhibited in the Women's Building, 1893 Exposition.
The Portrait Monument or here-- [left to right]
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott.
Exhibited individually in Women's Building,
1893 Exposition.
Now exhibited in the U. S.
Capitol Building, 1990s.
Read a
history and description of this statue.
Born on a farm in Illinois, Adelaide Johnson became known as the "sculptor of the women's
movement." After studying art and sculpture in Chicago and
Rome, she made busts of suffragists Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia
Mott, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, all of which were on display at
the 1893 World Fair. A decade later, Johnson secured a national
commission to create for the United States Capitol building a
sculpture called "The Women's Movement" or the
"Portrait Monument"
(its current name). Financed
by the National Woman's Party, this seven-ton marble statue
contained copies of the earlier busts of Anthony, Mott, and
Stanton. Dedicated in 1921 on Susan B. Anthony's birthday, it is
the only national monument to the woman's movement.
Biography
Two images: Monument to the Women's Movement, and Susan B.
Anthony
Letter from Susan B. Anthony--comments on the suffragist busts and
Johnson's unusual wedding.
Women of Achievement Exhibit Hall: The
Portrait Monument--read
details about the symbolization of the Woman's Movement sculpture
and its later history. A number of good images included.
Women of Vision, Women of Courage--find out more about the controversies
surrounding the The Portrait Monument and the lives of
the three women suffragists.
The Saga of the Moving of the Statue --news article on the history of this
statue. Good image included.
Biography of Alice Paul--refers to the National Woman's Party
commission and the title of Johnson's statue.
Women's Work Remains Unfinished--controversy over the Suffrage statue in
the 1990s.
Mary T. Lawrence (Tonetti) (1863 - 1945)
Figure of Columbus planting the Spanish flag
in the New
World--exhibited in front of the
Administration Building, 1893 Exposition.
Mary Lawrence Tonetti was born in New York and became an
assistant in 1888 to the famous sculptor Saint-Gaudens who was in
charge of selecting sculptors for the public statues at the 1893
Exposition. He chose his former pupil Lawrence to create the
Columbus statue (although Saint-Gaudens co-signed it). Eventually
she had a studio of her own and married French sculptor Francois
Tonetti.
General John A. Logan Monument, 1894-97
(Mary) Edmonia
Lewis (c. 1848 - after 1911)
Sleeping Infants--representative work
The Death of Cleopatra--exhibited
at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exposition.
View large Smithsonian image of Cleopatra
here.
The twelve-foot sculpture The Death of Cleopatra by Edmonia Lewis was on display in Chicago in 1892, but not at the
Women's Building or anywhere in the "White City" at the
1893 World Fair. Instead, it was on the wrong side of town--in
a saloon--and then lost soon after. A sculptor of mixed heritage
(part-Black, part Chippewa), Lewis had achieved some
international recognition of her work by 1876, but by the 1890s,
her remarkable statue had been sold, presumably to meet storage
costs, and was not recovered until nearly 100 years later.
Lewis's statue is included here for two reasons: 1) It is one of
the most remarkable statues of the 19th Century; and 2) The 1893
World Fair was criticized for being too "white." This
statue shows that outstanding sculpture by a minority woman was
available--right there in Chicago.
Edmonia Lewis
--biography and image of Hagar
The Object at Hand--loss and restoration of Cleopatra;
Testament to Bravery--more on the loss and restoration of Cleopatra
Edmonia Lewis--biography and several images of her other
statues.
19th Century Slides--scroll down to two more images of
statues by Lewis.
Edmonia Lewis--short biography; differs in some details from
the above one.
Defiant Women: Edmonia Lewis --more detailed biography, but differs
in some details from the above ones. Several good images of her
statues are included, plus several good links to other
information.
Edmonia Lewis--biography and links to four images of her
statues at the Smithsonian.
Image Gallery: Edmonia Lewis--click on seven images of her statues
Forever Free--good image; Forever Free
Marriage of Hiawatha--image; Old Indian Arrow Maker & His Daughter; Indian Hunter--scroll down to image.
Cleopatra and two other good images
3 images--Free at Last; Pompeian Girl; Old Arrow-Maker;
three more images here.
4 images
Bust of a Woman
Hagar in the Wilderness
(Mary) Evelyn Beatrice Longman (Batchelder) (1874 - 1954)
Head of Bacchante (Margaret French Cresson)
1903--
representative work
|
Victor--representative work |
Western
Electric logo--perhaps her |
Ceres statue at 1915 Exposition--representative work
It is unclear which work(s) Longman
exhibited at the 1893 World's Exposition
Evelyn B. Longman
was born in a log cabin in rural Ohio and, while studying at the Chicago Art
Institute, became one of Larado Taft's "white rabbit" assistants working on
sculpture for the 1893 World's Exposition. Later in New York, she worked
closely with the famous sculptor Daniel Chester French on projects like the
Lincoln Memorial until, in her forties, she married and moved to Connecticut.
Throughout her career, Longman received many important commissions and was the
first woman sculptor elected a full member of the National Academy of Design.
23 images,
plus biography
Biography and 6 images
Carol
Brooks MacNeil (1871 - 1944)
|
Dancing Woman statue-- |
Water Baby-- |
It is unclear which work(s) MacNeil
exhibited
in Fine Arts Palace, 1893 World's Exposition.
Born in Chicago,
Carol Brooks MacNeil studied sculpture at the Art Institute of Chicago and
assisted Lorado Taft in creating statues for the 1893 World's Exposition.
She continued her studies in Paris under the famous sculptor Frederick
MacMonnies and, in 1894, married sculptor Herman A. MacNeil. She exhibited
and won awards at later expositions.
Adelaide Manan (? - ?)
Sappho (scroll
down page)--exhibited
in the Women's Building, 1893 Exposition.
No biographical information on
Adelaide Manan is available online.
Helen F. Mears (1876 - 1916)
Genius of Wisconsin (or
here)--see the
statue in Capitol building.
Exhibited in the
Wisconsin Building, 1893 Exposition.
The female figure stands on
a rock (a firm foundation), her head resting
on the breast of the eagle (Old Abe), while his right wing stretches
protectingly over her. The folds of the American flag form her drapery--
Helen Mears was born in Wisconsin and studied at the Chicago
Art Institute under Lorado Taft. She was commissioned to create
her 9-foot statue "Genius of Wisconsin" for the
Wisconsin Building at the 1893 World Fair. Mears also studied
in New York and became an assistant to Saint-Gaudens, working in
Paris in 1898 on his Sherman Monument. Her numerous commissions
included a statue of Frances E. Willard, the first statue by a
woman accepted in the Capitol Building, Washington, D. C.
Biography;
another biography;
additional
biography.
Frances E. Willard--image; Frances E. Willard--image; Frances E. Willard--image, 1905
Augustus Saint-Gaudens--bas relief, 1898. Includes brief biography.
2 images -- (Augustus Saint-Gaudens and Reclining Cat)
Sherman Monument--1892-1903
Biography/image--(Master Charles Courtnay Hog and his Sis)
Helen Mears Studio--shows a number of sculptures
Model of statue proposed for State
Capitol
Aphrodite--1912.
Adin Randell--statue
in park
Master
Charles Courtenay Hoge & His Sister Frances Lupton Hoge, c.1915; bronze
plaque
Jean Pond Miner (Coburn) (1865 - 1967)
Forward 1893--exhibited in the Wisconsin
Building, 1893 Exposition.
The
Female figure stands upon
the prow of a boat with a figure-head
of "Old Abe." The boat is surging through the water;
the poised figure
stretches forth the right hand, while the left clasps the
American flag.
Jean Pond Miner
was born in Wisconsin, studied at the Chicago Art Institute, and
taught at the McGowan School for the Deaf until she became an
assistant to sculptor Lorado Taft. In 1893, she was appointed as
artist-in-residence at the Wisconsin Pavilion at the Exposition. A Wisconsin women's club commissioned Miner to make the
statue "Forward" to represent Wisconsin's progress.
Miner worked with pastels in her later years.
Short biography--scroll down the page
Forward--A Citizen's Success Story
Ousconsin--scroll down to Miner's name.
Blanche Nevin (1841 - 1925)
John Peter
Gabriel Muhlenberg (or here)--
representative work, presently on display
in the Capitol Building, Washington, DC.
Blanche Nevin was a poet as
well as artist. Her sculpture "Maud Muller," based on Whittier's poem,
received considerable attention at the 1876 World Fair in Philadelphia.
She also restored Windsor Forge, near Churchtown,
Lancaster Co. No other information is available online.
Elisabet Ney (1833 - 1907)
Stephen Austin-- |
Samuel Houston -- |
Born Franzisca Bernadina Wilhelmina Elisabeth Ney in Westphalia
(now Germany), Elisabet Ney studied at the Royal Bavarian Academy of Fine
Arts in Munich. Her busts of famous figures like Schopenhauer,
King George V of Hanover, Garibaldi, and Bismarck brought her
fame. She was appointed court sculptor to Ludwig II of Bavaria in
1867, but possible political intrigues forced her and her husband
(Edmund Duncan Montgomery) into exile in 1870. Settling in Texas,
Ney gave up sculpting for 20 years to raise her son, but she came
out of retirement in 1890 to sculpt the two Texas heroes
exhibited at the 1893 World Fair.
Lady MacBeth 1905
(Theodora) Alice Ruggles (Kitson) (1876 - 1932)
Aux Bords de L'Oise (On the Banks of the Oise)--
scroll
down the page
exhibited in Fine Arts Palace, 1893 Exposition.
Young Orpheus
c. 1890 [my scan]--
exhibited in the Fine Arts Palace, 1893 Exposition.
A New England Fisherman 1892
and
Portrait Bust of an Italian Child c. 1887
(images unavailable) -- exhibited in
Fine Arts Palace, 1893 Exposition.
Born in Massachusetts, the teenaged
Theo Alice Ruggles studied sculpture under Henry Hudson
Kitson whom she would later marry in 1893. She is probably best
remembered for her "hiker" statues which were erected
in many communities throughout the country in memory of the
servicemen killed in the Spanish-American War (1898-99). She was
a prolific and well-respected artist in her day.
Cat image
Massachusetts State Memorial--soldier statute 1905; large image here.
Iron Mike or the Student Soldier--description and several images
Spanish American War Memorial ("The Spirit of '98" or
"The Hiker") 1923.
Important Sculptures in Los Angeles
County--description;
more information here--scroll down the page.
Thaddeus Kosciuszko 1910
Vicksburg Artists - Theo
Alice Ruggles Kitson--many,
many images of military relief portraits.
Janet Scudder
(1873 - 1940)
|
Frog Fountain c.
1899-- |
Cupid atop Tortoise: Fountain-- representative work |
The Young Pan--
representative work |
Biography/ 1 image--good
biography
Biography/21
images
Biography and image
Fountain:
Diana 1911
Young Diana c. 1918.
Wall Fountain Sculpture
2 images
Luella Varney (Serrao) (1865 - after 1935)
Right
Reverend Amadeus Rappe, D.D 1888
--representative work.
Mark Twain
(bronze) and
Portrait of a Lady (marble)
-- exhibited
in Fine Arts Palace, 1893 Exposition.
Luella Varney was trained in Italy. In
addition to the sculptures listed on this page, she also made a bust of Julia
Ward Howe. No other information is available online.
Bust of Mary Baker Eddy
Perkins
Monument 1891
Bessie (Onahotema) Potter Vonnoh (1872 - 1955)
Minuet
[or Dancing Girl]--representative work
|
Young Mother c. 1896--cast in bronze 1913. |
Portrait of a Woman
[title unknown]-- |
|
American Girl--representative
work |
Butterflies--representative work |
| Bird Fountain--representative work | Woman with Scarf--representative work |
Bust of a Gentleman --
representative work.
Portrait of Prof.
David Swing (image unavailable)--
exhibited in Fine Arts Palace, 1893 Exposition.
Born in Missouri and raised in Chicago,
Bessie
Potter Vonnoh was one of Lorado Taft's female assistants at the 1893 World Fair
where she also did the decorative sculpture called "Art" on the Women's
Building. After studying in Paris, she returned to America and
considerable success with her Troubetzkoy-influenced graceful statuettes.
She and her husband-painter Robert Vonnoh were part of the art colony at Old
Lyme, Connecticut.
Statuettes by Bessie Potter--1897 article with several images of her
work.
Biography / Minuet sculpture c. 1898 or two images--Young Mother and Minuet
Mother and Child
The Fan
1910
Fountain in Memory of Theordore Roosevelt
and his Conservation Efforts--scroll down the page
James S. Sherman, Vice President
Goodnight c. 1900
The dancing girl
Statue--Cinderella, 1906
In Arcadia c. 1926 ; here also; large one here
Young Girl c. 1940
Enthroned 1902
72 images--click on "Image Gallery"; also click
on Biography
A
Study--biography included
Garden Figure c.
1931
Julia M. (Bracken) Wendt
(1871 - 1942)
Lincoln
the Lawyer 1925--
representative work.
The
Apache Fire Hole--representative work
James Monroe
and Illinois Welcoming the
Nations (images unavailable) -- exhibited
at Illinois Building, 1893 Exposition.
Julia Bracken Wendt was born in Illinois and became one of Lorado Taft's female
assistants at the 1893 World Fair where her statue representing the women of
Illinois ("Illinois Welcoming the Nations") was exhibited at the Illinois
pavilion and later placed in the Illinois state capitol building along with her
statue of James Monroe. After she and her husband moved to California, she
created a eleven-foot high allegorical work "The Three Graces: Art,
Science and History (1914)--draped goddesses holding up electrically lit
globes--on display in the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. She
became the city's leading sculptor.
2
images--click on "Image Gallery" and on
"biography"
Frank
Putnam Flint Fountain; Flint
Fountain: Historical Background
Anne Whitney (1821 - 1915)
|
Lief Ericsson--scroll down the page. |
Roma (1890)--bronze statue exhibited |
Bust of Lucy Stone--exhibited
in
Women's
Building, 1893 Exposition.
At the 1893 World Fair, Anne Whitney was an established older sculptor. Born in Massachusetts and educated in art
at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and in Boston, Whitney lost one commission when it was discovered that she was a woman sculptor.
However, she ended up creating many prominent statues, such as
her marble sculpture of the Revolutionary War hero Samuel Adams in Statuary Hall in the Capitol
Building in
Washington, D.C. Her sculptures often carried a social message. Africa
(1864) showed a woman awakening from the sleep of slavery, and Roma
represented the poverty in Rome as a beggar-woman. She also sculpted busts of suffragists and
abolitionists she admired. Her partner was Abby Adeline Manning, a
painter.
Biography;
Biography--mentions other statues
Whitney, Anne--short biography
Lief Ericksson (scroll down the page)
Samuel Adams--image Samuel Adams; Laura Brown--image; Keats--image
2 statues--Senator Charles Sumner & temperance leader
Frances Willard
19th Century Slides--scroll down to six images of statues by
Whitney.
Illustration: for Jewett's texts--for "Farmer Finch"
Le Modele--scroll
down the page; or
here
(Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Enid Bland Yandell (1870 - 1934)
Boys--representative
work
Daniel Boone (larger image) -- exhibited
before the Kentucky Building, 1893 Exposition.
Large image
here or here. See placement of statue.
See also
Caryatids--
Women's Building, 1893 Exposition.
Enid Yandell
from Louisville, Kentucky studied under Auguste Rodin and Frederick
MacMonnies. Besides her Daniel Boone and the caryatids on the
Women's Building, Yandell's other statues
at the 1893 World Fair included Henry Clay and
her "Parthenon" statues on the porticoes of the Columbian Exposition
Hall. Along with two
associates, Yandell wrote Three Girls in a Flat (1892) based on her personal experiences
with the Women's Building. Her later spectacular
fountain sculpture "The Struggle of Life" (to escape male figures personifying
Duty, Avarice, and Passion) was exhibited at the 1901 World Fair. Yandell was the first woman to be
admitted to membership in the National Sculpture Society.
Enid Yandell Biography
--plus 2 images.
2 images in Image Gallery--sundials
Biography; Athena; forty-foot Athena--to get some idea how large
this statue is
Enid Bland Yandell--scroll down to last entry
Enid Yandell--scroll down to her name
Three statues--including the large sections of her Athena.
Ninigret--image; Bas Relief--image of Julia Dinsmore
Some of the above information
came from these sources:
Jeanne Madeline Weimann, The Fair Women, Chicago 1981.
F. Graeme Chalmers, Women in the Nineteenth Century Art World, Westport 1988.
Paul V. Galvin, World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, Library Digital History Collection, Illinois Institute of Technology.
These pages are for educational use only.
Text written by K. L. Nichols
Return to Nichols Home Page
Suggestions/Comments:
knichols@pittstate.edu
Posted: 6-25-02; Updated: 10-30-03
