''Death and the Sculptor'', also known as the Milmore Monument and ''The Angel of Death and the Young Sculptor'' is a sculpture in bronze, and one of the most important and influential works of art created by sculptor Daniel Chester French. The work was commissioned to mark the grave in

Forest Hills Cemetery Forest Hills Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery, greenspace, arboretum and sculpture garden located in the Forest Hills section of the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. The cemetery was established in 1848 as a public ...

Jamaica Plain Jamaica Plain is a neighborhood of in the City of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. Settled by Puritans seeking farmland to the south, it was originally part of the former Town of Roxbury, now also a part of the City of Boston. The commun ...

, Boston, Massachusetts, of the brothers Joseph (1841–1886), James and

Martin Milmore __NOTOC__ Martin Milmore (1844–1883) was an American sculptor. Life and career Martin Milmore was born in Sligo, Ireland on September 14, 1844. He immigrated to Boston at age seven, graduated from Boston Latin School in 1860, took art lesso ...

(1844–1883). It has two figures effectively in the round, linked to a background

relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...

behind them. The right-hand figure represents a sculptor, whose hand holding a chisel is gently restrained by the fingers of the left-hand figure, representing

Death Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...

, here shown as a winged female.

Subjects

The Milmore brothers immigrated to the United States from Ireland in 1851, Joseph becoming a stone carver and Martin a sculptor. They frequently collaborated on commissions, the most notable one being the granite ''Sphinx'' (1873) that resides in Mount Auburn Cemetery.

Work

The Angel of Death and the Sculptor from the Milmore Memorial MET DT96

French's memorial, commissioned in 1889 and dedicated in 1893, depicts the Angel of Death gently taking the hand of a sculptor, or stone carver who is working on a sphinx figure very much like the one the brothers created. When the plaster cast of the work was in Paris to be cast into bronze it was exhibited at several salons, including the Salon de Champs de Mars where it was awarded a third-class medal, "only the second time an American had been so honored by the Parisian art world."Richman, Michael, ''Daniel Chester French: An American Sculptor'', The Preservation Press, Washington D.C., 1976 pp. 71-79. The architectural setting was initially designed by architect C. Howard Walker, but this was redesigned by French's frequent collaborator

Henry Bacon Henry Bacon (November 28, 1866February 16, 1924) was an American Beaux-Arts architect who is best remembered for the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. (built 1915–1922), which was his final project. Education and early career Henr ...

in 1914, and finally replaced in 1945 by one designed the Boston firm of Andrews, Jones Boscoe and Whitmore, at which time the location of the monument was changed. The bronze portion was cast in Paris by the Gruet Foundry. French and the Milmore family agreed to have four other casts of the piece done, which went to museums in Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston and St. Louis. The Chicago plaster was displayed at the

World's Columbian Exposition The World's Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World's Fair) was a world's fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. The centerpiece of the Fair, hel ...

, where it received good reviews. That cast was destroyed in 1949.Brown, Fern et al, ''Revisiting the White City: American Art at the 1893 World’s Fair'', National Museum of American Art, National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonain Institution, Washington D.C., 1993 In 1917, another version of the work was done, this time in

marble Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite. Marble is typically not foliated (layered), although there are exceptions. In geology, the term ''marble'' refers to metamorphose ...

for the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

in New York. It was carved by the Piccirilli Brothers, who carved virtually all of French's marbles.

References

{{Public art in Boston Outdoor sculptures in Boston Monuments and memorials in Boston Bronze sculptures in Massachusetts 1893 sculptures Funerary art Sculptures by Daniel Chester French Sculptures of angels Works about the visual arts Granite sculptures in Massachusetts Sculptures of men in Massachusetts Cemetery art

Subjects

Work

See also

References