National Sculpture Society

Last updated

Founded in 1893, the National Sculpture Society (NSS) was the first organization of professional sculptors formed in the United States. The purpose of the organization was to promote the welfare of American sculptors, although its founding members included several renowned architects. The founding members included such well known figures of the day as Daniel Chester French, Augustus St. Gaudens, Richard Morris Hunt, and Stanford White as well as sculptors less familiar today, such as Herbert Adams, Paul W. Bartlett, Karl Bitter, J. Massey Rhind, Attilio Piccirilli, and John Quincy Adams Ward—who served as the first president for the society.

Since its founding in the nineteenth century, the National Sculpture Society (NSS) has remained dedicated to promoting figurative and realistic sculpture. During the years 1919 to 1924, four works commissioned from members of the National Sculpture Society were funded by philanthropist Paul Goodloe McIntire, including George Rogers Clark (1921) by Robert Ingersoll Aitken at Charlottesville, Virginia. [1] Membership worldwide in 2006 was around 4,000 members, including sculptors, architects, art historians, and conservators. Its headquarters, library, and gallery are located in midtown Manhattan.

In 1951, the NSS started publishing Sculpture Review , a quarterly magazine. It is now published for NSS by Sage Publishing in conjunction with Policy Studies Organization.

Past presidents of the society have included John Quincy Adams Ward, James Earle Fraser, Chester Beach, Wheeler Williams, Leo Friedlander, Neil Estern, and Cecil de Blaquiere Howard.

The first woman to gain admission into the NSS was Theo Alice Ruggles Kitson, in 1893. She was followed a few years later by Enid Yandell and Bessie Potter Vonnoh in 1898; Janet Scudder in 1904; Anna Hyatt Huntington in 1905 and Evelyn Longman and Abastenia St. Leger Eberle in 1906. In 1946, Richmond Barthé was likely the first African-American to be admitted.

In 1994, the NSS held their first exhibition outside the United States at the Palazzo Mediceo Di Seravezza in Italy. Titled “100 Years of the National Sculpture Society of the United States of America in Italy” it ran from the 16th of July through the 4th of September and was curated by Nicky and Stanley Bleifeld along with Costantino Paolicchi in collaboration with Lodovico Gierut and Paolo Giorgi. Among the 60 notable American sculptors whose work was selected for the exhibition were Stanley Bleifeld, Andrew DeVries, Neil Estern, Leonda Finke, Bruno Lucchesi, Barbara Lekberg, Richard MacDonald and Elliott Offner. [2]

Related Research Articles

Daniel Chester French American sculptor (1850–1931)

Daniel Chester French was an American sculptor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, best known for his design of the monumental statue of Abraham Lincoln (1920) in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Lorado Taft

Lorado Zadok Taft was an American sculptor, writer and educator. His 1903 book, The History of American Sculpture, was the first survey of the subject and stood for decades as the standard reference. He has been credited with helping to advance the status of women as sculptors.

National Academy of Design professional honorary organization with a school and museum

The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American artists, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse, Asher Durand, Thomas Cole, Martin E. Thompson, Charles Cushing Wright, Ithiel Town, and others "to promote the fine arts in America through instruction and exhibition." Membership is limited to 450 American artists and architects, who are elected by their peers on the basis of recognized excellence.

Boston Athenæum

The Boston Athenæum is one of the oldest independent libraries in the United States. It is also one of a number of membership libraries, for which patrons pay a yearly subscription fee to use Athenæum services. The institution was founded in 1807 by the Anthology Club of Boston, Massachusetts. It is located at 10 1/2 Beacon Street on Beacon Hill.

John Quincy Adams Ward American sculptor

John Quincy Adams Ward was an American sculptor, whose most familiar work is his larger than life-size standing statue of George Washington on the steps of Federal Hall National Memorial in New York City.

Pietrasanta Comune in Tuscany, Italy

Pietrasanta is a town and comune on the coast of northern Tuscany in Italy, in the province of Lucca. Pietrasanta is part of Versilia, on the last foothills of the Apuan Alps, about 32 kilometres (20 mi) north of Pisa. The town is located 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) off the coast, where the frazione of Marina di Pietrasanta is located.

Adeline Pond Adams

Adeline Valentine Pond Adams (1859–1948) was an American writer and the wife of Herbert Adams. The chief subjects of her writings were American fine artists and art history. She published at least seven texts. On December 14, 1930, she was awarded a Special Medal of Honor by the National Sculpture Society.

Hermon Atkins MacNeil American sculptor

Hermon Atkins MacNeil was an American sculptor born in Everett, Massachusetts. He is known for designing the Standing Liberty quarter, struck by the Mint from 1916-1930; and for sculpting Justice, the Guardian of Liberty on the east pediment of the United States Supreme Court building.

The following are events from the year 1825 in the United States.

The Piccirilli Brothers were an Italian family of renowned marble carvers and sculptors who carved many of the most significant marble sculptures in the United States, including Daniel Chester French’s colossal Abraham Lincoln (1920) in the Lincoln Memorial, Washington, D.C.

James A. Garfield Monument

The James A. Garfield Monument stands on the grounds of the United States Capitol in the circle at First Street, S.W., and Maryland Avenue, Washington, D.C. It is a memorial to United States President James A. Garfield, elected in 1880 and assassinated in 1881 after serving only four months of his term, by a disgruntled office-seeker named Charles J. Guiteau.

Francis Edwin Elwell

Francis Edwin Elwell was an American sculptor, teacher and author.

Stanley Bleifeld was an American sculptor.

Grand Central Art Galleries Art gallery in New York, United States

The Grand Central Art Galleries were the exhibition and administrative space of the nonprofit Painters and Sculptors Gallery Association, an artists' cooperative established in 1922 by Walter Leighton Clark together with John Singer Sargent, Edmund Greacen, and others. Artists closely associated with the Grand Central Art Galleries included Hovsep Pushman, George de Forest Brush, and especially Sargent, whose posthumous show took place there in 1928.

Elsie Ward

Elsie Ward (1871-1923) was an American sculptor born in Fayette, Missouri. Her collection largely consists of bronze and other metal sculptures. Ward worked on a host of diverse works of art, but "Her specialty was portraits, busts, and reliefs."

Society of American Graphic Artists

The Society of American Graphic Artists (SAGA) is a not for profit national fine arts organization serving professional artists in the field of printmaking. SAGA provides its members with exhibition, reviews and networking opportunities in the New York City area and, in addition to various substantial exhibition prizes, many purchase awards allow SAGA members to be included in major U.S. museum collections.

C. Percival Dietsch, full name Clarence Percival Dietsch, was an American born in New York City and raised in The Bronx, NY, as the youngest child of Morris Dietsch and New York-born Clara M. Dietsch. Morris and his twin brother Leonard were born in America to Frederick and Margaret Dietsch after they emigrated with other children of theirs from Germany in 1836.

Neil Carl Estern was an American sculptor. Known for his public monuments, Estern's best-known works are his sculptures of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Fala at the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington. Estern was also the creator of Patti Playpal.

Public sculptures by Daniel Chester French Wikipedia list page

Daniel Chester French (1850–1931) was an American sculptor who was active in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He was born in Exeter, New Hampshire, to Anne Richardson French and Henry Flagg French on April 20, 1850. His father, a polymath, was a judge and college president who popularized the French drain. In 1867, the family moved to Concord, Massachusetts, and French enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. French did not perform well academically and, after a year, he left the college and returned to Concord where he first learned sculpture while attending art classes with Louisa May Alcott. Between 1869 and 1872, French studied anatomy with William Rimmer, and in 1870 he undertook a one-month apprenticeship with the sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward. After completing The Minute Man in 1875, French studied sculpture in Florence, Italy, for a year, during part of which he worked out of Thomas Ball's studio.

References

  1. Betsy Gohdes-Baten (April 1996). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: George Rogers Clark Sculpture" (PDF).
  2. National Sculpture Society, Finito di stampare nel mese di luglio 1994 dalle EDIZIONI ETS Pisa