William Mozart McVey (July 12, 1905 – May 30, 1995) was an American sculptor,

animalier An animalier (, ) is an artist, mainly from the 19th century, who specializes in, or is known for, skill in the realistic portrayal of animals. "Animal painter" is the more general term for earlier artists. Although the work may be in any genre ...

and teacher.

Life

He was born in Boston, Massachusetts. His family moved to

Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S ...

, when McVey was still in high school. Following his graduation he attended the

Cleveland School of Art The Cleveland Institute of Art, previously Cleveland School of Art, is a private college focused on art and design and located in Cleveland, Ohio. History The college was founded in 1882 as the Western Reserve School of Design for Women, at firs ...

. He left to attend

Rice University William Marsh Rice University (Rice University) is a Private university, private research university in Houston, Houston, Texas. It is on a 300-acre campus near the Houston Museum District and adjacent to the Texas Medical Center. Rice is ranke ...

, where he played football under Coach

John Heisman John William Heisman (October 23, 1869 – October 3, 1936) was a player and coach of American football, baseball, and basketball, as well as a sportswriter and actor. He served as the head football coach at Oberlin College, Buchtel College ...

in 1924 while studying illustration. He returned to art school in Cleveland but did not study sculpture there because "his personality (was) incompatible with that of

Herman Matzen Herman Matzen (July 15, 1861 – April 22, 1938) American sculptor and educator, born in Denmark. Early years Matzen studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich and the Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin before immigrating to the United States. ...

, who headed the department." While studying at night he worked for the Gandola Brothers making tombstones. In 1929, a patron financed a "shoe-string' budgeted trip to Paris, where he studied with Despiau and Gimond as well as earning a meager living as one of three American guides at the

Louvre Museum The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

. In 1932, after three years in Paris, he returned to Cleveland and taught at the

Cleveland Museum of Art The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, located in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on the city's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian ...

. Shortly afterwards he was employed by the

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

for whom he created several works using the

direct carving This page describe terms and jargon related to sculpture and sculpting. __NOTOC__ A armature :An armature is an internal frame or skeleton which supports a modelled sculpture. A typical armature for a small sculpture is made of heavy gau ...

approach. Around 1935, McVey returned to Texas to teach at the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

Austin Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...

. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

he entered the

army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

and was stationed at Fort Randolph Army Base, where he taught plane and ship

silhouette A silhouette ( , ) is the image of a person, animal, object or scene represented as a solid shape of a single colour, usually black, with its edges matching the outline of the subject. The interior of a silhouette is featureless, and the silhou ...

recognition Recognition may refer to: *Award, something given in recognition of an achievement Machine learning *Pattern recognition, a branch of machine learning which encompasses the meanings below Biometric * Recognition of human individuals, or biomet ...

." Called up to explain why his students were being taught art in their classes, a test of his students showed that they scored higher in "recognition' tests than students taught in the traditional manner, and his approach was subsequently adopted by the other classes. Following his discharge from the

McVey, then married to "radical"

ceramicist Ceramic art is art made from ceramic materials, including clay. It may take forms including artistic pottery, including tableware, tiles, figurines and other sculpture. As one of the plastic arts, ceramic art is one of the visual arts. Wh ...

Leza McVey, moved to

Cranbrook Academy of Art The Cranbrook Educational Community is an education, research, and public museum complex in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. This National Historic Landmark was founded in the early 20th century by newspaper mogul George Gough Booth. It consists of C ...

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan Bloomfield Hills is a small city (5.04 sq. miles) in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is a northern suburb of Metro Detroit and is approximately northwest of Downtown Detroit. Except a small southern border with the city of Bir ...

, where he taught sculpture (1947–1954) and she studied with

Maija Grotell Maija (Majlis) Grotell (August 19, 1899 — December 6, 1973) was an influential Finnish-American ceramic artist and educator. She is often described as the "Mother of American Ceramics." Early life and education Finland Maija Grotell was born ...

. He died in

on May 30, 1995. His papers are held at

Honors

McVey was a member of the National Sculpture Society and exhibited in its 49th Annual Exhibition, "Sculpture, Reliefs, Medals held in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1982 where he showed a bronze ''Walrus.'' He won the 1964 Cleveland Arts Prize.

Selected works

* "Bruno the Bear" ca. 1933,

Cleveland Museum of Natural History The Cleveland Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum located approximately five miles (8 km) east of downtown Cleveland, Ohio in University Circle, a 550-acre (220 ha) concentration of educational, cultural and medical instit ...

- New Deal sculpture project *

James Bowie James Bowie ( ) ( – March 6, 1836) was a 19th-century American pioneer, slave smuggler and trader, and soldier who played a prominent role in the Texas Revolution. He was among the Americans who died at the Battle of the Alamo. Stories of h ...

statue,

Texarkana, Texas Texarkana is a city in Bowie County, Texas, United States, in the Ark-La-Tex region. Located approximately from Dallas, Texarkana is a twin city with neighboring Texarkana, Arkansas. The Texas city's population was 36,193 at the 2020 censu ...

, 1936 *

Davy Crockett David Crockett (August 17, 1786 – March 6, 1836) was an American folk hero, frontiersman, soldier, and politician. He is often referred to in popular culture as the "King of the Wild Frontier". He represented Tennessee in the U.S. House of ...

statue, (1936) monumental

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unit ...

bas 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 the ...

granite memorial with Crockett's quote, "Be sure you are right, then go ahead" carved on the front.

Ozona, Texas Ozona is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) that serves as the county seat of Crockett County, Texas, United States. The population was 3,225 at the time of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. Ozona is the onl ...

. This and the Bowie statue were commissioned as part of the

Texas Centennial The Texas Centennial Exposition was a world's fair presented from June 6 to November 29, 1936, at Fair Park, Dallas, Texas. A celebration of the 100th anniversary of Texas's independence from Mexico in 1836, it also celebrated Texas and Western Am ...

celebration. * ''Rolling Bear Cubs'', (1937) limestone,

Houston Zoo The Houston Zoo is a zoological park located within Hermann Park in Houston, Texas, United States. The zoo houses over 6,000 animals from more than 600 species. It receives 2.1 million visitors each year and is the second most visited zoo i ...

Houston, Texas Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...

* Stone

frieze In architecture, the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Paterae are also usually used to decorate friezes. Even when neither columns nor ...

(circa 1938) at the base of the

San Jacinto Monument The San Jacinto Monument is a column located on the Houston Ship Channel in unincorporated Harris County, Texas, about 16 miles due east of downtown Houston. The monument is topped with a 220-ton star that commemorates the site of the Battle of ...

near Houston * Statue of Winston Churchill (1966), stands outside the British Embassy in

Washington D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, Na ...

* George Washington Monument (1972–73), Washington Square,

Anthony J. Celebrezze Federal Building The Anthony J. Celebrezze Federal Building (also known as the Federal Office Building, the Celebrezze Building, or the Federal Building for short) is a skyscraper located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. Design The building was designed by the firms o ...

, Cleveland, Ohio. * ''Icarus'', (1990) larger than life-size granite monument in

Denison, Texas Denison is a city in Grayson County, Texas, United States. It is south of the Texas–Oklahoma border. The population was 22,682 at the 2010 census. Denison is part of the Texoma region and is one of two principal cities in the Sherman–Deni ...

, for the pioneer pilots of Texas, especially those who gave their lives in various wars. * ''Hart Crane Memorial'', John and Mildred Putnam Sculpture Collection * ''McDog'' (1985), Cleveland Botanical Gardens in Cleveland, Ohio. Sculpture is of McVey's pet Airedale.

References

External links

Guide to the William M. McVey papers, 1922-1976
(Woodson Research Center, Fondren Library, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA) {{DEFAULTSORT:McVey, William 1905 births 1995 deaths Sculptors from Massachusetts Section of Painting and Sculpture artists United States Army personnel of World War II Artists from Boston Cleveland Institute of Art alumni Rice University alumni University of Texas faculty Davy Crockett 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century male artists American male sculptors