Andromeda (1929) 15-1/2" H
x 16" W
Cold Cast White Marble
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Near the end of his career, French chose to portray the beauty
of the modern woman through Andromeda, a work he did not
publicly display. It was, as French wrote, "not an order,
but just for fun." The sculpture is titled after the mythological
princess, rescued by Perseus, who was chained to a rock by her
father, King Cepheus, as a sacrifice to appease Neptune, the
god of the sea. French used a life cast of a female torso and
hired a young local woman to model for him. Andromeda was
begun in the summer of 1929 and by January 1931 a full-size plaster
model was delivered to the Piccirilli Brothers, stone carvers
in the Bronx, New York, who copied it in Carrara marble. It was
delivered to his Chesterwood studio in August of that year where
he worked on the finishing touches up until his death on October
11, 1931. In an interview about his work, French told a reporter
from the New York Sun, that "the modern woman...
has reached a perfection which woman hasn't achieved since the
days of Greece. The reason is very simple. She is the first free
woman of many centuries." Andromeda rests in the
center of the studio at Chesterwood, just where French left it. |
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