Augustus Saint-Gaudens

Augustus Saint-Gaudens

Born 1848, Dublin, Ireland

Died 1907, Cornish, NH

 

Augustus Saint-Gaudens was one of the foremost artists in America, excelling in portraiture, relief sculpture and medallic art.  Among his best-known works and his only nude female figure, Diana has sparked controversy since her creation, but was eventually accepted as a beautiful symbol of the Gilded Age.  Placed atop the tower of the original Madison Square Garden in 1891, the first figure of iron and gilded copper was an ungainly wind vane with billowing drapery that would not revolve.  It was removed in 1892.

 

A smaller, more streamlined version in gilded copper was designed in 1893 and successfully replaced the earlier work in 1894.  It remained in place until 1925 when the building was demolished.  The sculpture was given to the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1932.

 

The bronze in the collection of Brookgreen Gardens was made from a unique Portland cement cast of the second version which Saint-Gaudens had given in 1894 to his friend and frequent collaborator, Stanford White, the architect of Madison Square Garden.  It was cast by John H. A. Walthausen of New York City from the original half-size plaster model.  This was the model from which the second version of Diana was mechanically enlarged.  The half-size plaster model was destroyed in 1904 in a studio fire at Aspet, Saint Gaudens’ home in Cornish, NH.  As a result, the cement cast, which stood for many years in the garden of Box Hill, Stanford White’s Long Island estate, remains an important detailed record of the sculpture.

 

Although the second version of Diana was copyrighted in January 1895, Saint-Gaudens had begun to produce reductions almost as soon as the figure was finished.  The reductions were not made mechanically.  They were remodeled by hand and show significant differences in hair, bow style, and pedestal style from one edition to another.  Some were sold in the gallery of Tiffany Jewelers.  Several of these reductions are in museums, including the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, and the Carnegie Museum of Art at Pittsburgh.

 

In 1927, the White family commissioned the Osterkampmead Corporation in New York City to cast a bronze from the cement Diana.  This work was done by Priessmann, Bauer & Co., a foundry in Munich, Germany.  In 1928, a second gilded bronze was made at the request of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  It stood for many years above the museum’s main staircase.  Another gilded bronze made at that time as well as the cement cast are in the collection of the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, TX.

 

In 1979, the cement cast was used again as a model for another edition of bronzes.  The Madison Square Garden Corporation commissioned a new bronze Diana in recognition of their Centennial Celebration.  A limited edition of six was cast at the Bedi-Makky Art Foundry, one of which was permanently installed at Madison Square Garden.  Others from the edition are located at the Princeton University Art Museum, at Brookgreen Gardens, and in private collections.

 

Diana

Bronze, designed in 1893, cast in 1979

Unsigned

Cast by Bedi-Makky Art Foundry

Gift of Joseph Veach Noble in memory of Olive Ashley Mooney Noble

S.1990.003