ANNA HYATT HUNTINGTON‘S JOAN
by Joan K. Yanni
The Gallery's statue of Joan of Arc is the figure of a legendary woman who saved her country, and it was created with insight by a woman who was one of the most admired sculptors of her time.
Anna Hyatt Huntington (1876-1973) was born in Cambridge, Mass., where her father was a Harvard professor of paleontology and her mother an amateur painter. Anna grew up with a series of unusual pets provided by her father, as well as access to a backyard studio where she and her older sister Harriet could sculpt. (Harriet was studying at the time with sculptor Henry Hudson Kitson.)
Although Anna had been looking toward a career as a violinist, she turned to sculpture after her sister asked her to create an animal for a group she was planning. Her first attempt was so successful that she began to take lessons, first from Kitson and later at the Art Students League and Syracuse University, Though her father encouraged her training, he advised her to rely more on direct observation of her subjects—their bones, muscles and movements—than on art instruction. She was interested mostly in animals, particularly horses, and made sketches in clay at stables, zoos and circuses. By 1906 she had sold enough of her work to travel to France and acquire a studio.
Anna had always been interested in Joan of Arc, the peasant girl who heard Voices telling her that she must become the savior of France. (Joan succeeded in getting the dauphin crowned and chasing the English from Orleans, only to be captured, tried as a witch, and burned at the stake.) Now in France, Joan's country, Anna's desire to create a statue of the Maid of Orleans became almost an obsession. She could picture an inspired Joan astride her horse, standing on the stirrups and saluting Heaven with her uplifted sword. But the representation of Joan's horse was not as clear. Anna began to look for a mount that would express sturdiness, spirit and power. She found her ideal in a stable of delivery horses and went there each day to make clay sketches.
To make her Joan a real person rather than merely a suit of armor, Anna modeled the figure first, and added the armor afterwards. Her finished statue was cast in plaster and exhibited in the spring Paris Salon in 1910.
The sculpture was awarded an honorable mention by the Salon. It was said that the judges did not give it a medal because they could not believe that woman could have done the strenuous work alone.
Anna's Joan was seen by a member of a Franco-American committee looking for a sculptor to create a statue of Joan for a New York site. Anna was commissioned to do the work. For this new statue, an expert form the Metropolitan Museum provided medieval armor of the type Joan would have worn, and stones originally part of the tower of Rouen, where she was imprisoned, were brought from France for the base. The competed statue was placed in Riverside Drive and unveiled in 1915. In recognition of Anna's work, France awarded her the Purple Rosette of the Legion of Honor.
In 1921 Anna received a commission to design a commemorative medal for railroad heir Archer Milton Huntington, poet, art collector, and founder of museums. An admirer of all things Spanish, Huntington had translated Spanish works and founded the Hispanic Museum. Their relationship led to marriage in 1926—and to Anna's creation of the epic sculpture El Cid Campeador, a spirited figure of the Spanish hero riding into battle. One casting of the sculpture stands in the Hispanic Museum, NYC, another in Balboa Park, San Diego, and still another in Seville, Spain.
Anna continued with her prolific work even through a ten-year bout with tuberculosis. In her sculpture she began to use human as well as animal forms. In 1930 the Huntingtons bought 7000 acres in South Carolina and developed them into Brookgreen Gardens, including a wildlife refuge and a ten-acre outdoor American sculpture museum. In 1940 they purchased a farm in Connecticut. Anna took over the practical running of the farm in addition to working in a studio built on the grounds. Here she produced such works as the young Lincoln of The Prairie Years and the symbolic Youth Taming the Wild.
After her husband's death in 1955, Anna continued to produce amazing numbers of sculptures and receive countless honors. In 1960 she was named outstanding Woman of the Year by Who's Who in America. She worked in her studio until 1972, when she was 96. She died in 1973.
MAG’s Joan of Arc is a reduction—a small version of the original reworked on a smaller scale by the artist. It is marked #11 of a multiple edition cast by Gorham Company Founders.
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