雙語+MP3|美國學生藝術史58 女雕刻家的作品

 
幾年后，丹尼爾·切斯特·佛蘭奇又刻了一座叫做《死神阻止雕刻家干活》雕像。從雕像上我們可以看到，死亡女神正伸手握住一位年輕雕刻家的手，他正在雕刻一座獅身人面像的淺浮雕。毋庸置疑，一旦死亡女神抓住了他的手，他就再也沒有辦法完成作品了。這座雕像是為紀念一位名叫米爾莫爾的年輕雕刻家。他剛開始創(chuàng)作就去世了，所以有時候這座雕像也叫做“米爾莫爾紀念碑”。 
58 WOMEN’S WORK女雕刻家的作品
 
MEN have made so many good statues that there isn’t room in one book to tell you about them all. Perhaps you notice that I said men have made so many good statues. What about women? It is true that all the statues that I have told you about so far have been made by men. Until recently women have not been good sculptors. Generally they have not been good sculptors because they have not been sculptors at all—until recently. 
The first person to make portrait statues in America was a woman whose name is now unimportant. Her portrait statues were very lifelike. They were made of wax and colored to look like real people and were just the same size as real people. She even dressed them in real clothes just like the wax figures. And then later a Madame Tussaud made the same king of wax figures of people famous in history Madame Tussaud’s Waxworks are in London and you can go there and see such men as Napoleon and Theodore Roosevelt and Marshal Foch all looking so lifelike that they really seem ready to speak. 
But waxworks aren’t considered really truly sculpture, any more than a colored photograph is considered a really truly painting. After the early waxworks more and more women studied to be sculptors, especially in the United States, until now we have women sculptors who are just as good as men sculptors and so many of them that I can’t begin to tell you about all of them. There is room for only two, I’m sorry to say, in this chapter. 
One of these two is Mrs. Anna Hyatt Huntington. Mrs. Huntington has two favorite subjects for her statues. She is famous for her animal statues and for her Joan of Arc statues. The statue below combines both subjects. It is of Joan of Arc on a horse. Some people who write about art (they are called art critics) say that this statue of Joan of Arc is the best Joan of Arc statue that any one has ever made. Most statues of Joan of Arc show her as too old or too big or too grown-up looking. Joan of Arc was only seventeen when she led the French armies against their enemies. In Mrs. Huntington’s statue Joan looks only seventeen. Then again, people who know about the kind of armor worn in the time of Joan of Arc say that Mrs. Huntington is the first sculptor to put exactly the right armor and equipment on Joan and on Joan’s horse. 
 
No.58-1　JOAN OF ARC（《圣女貞德》）　HUNTINGTON（亨廷頓　制） 
Courtesy of The University prints 
Perhaps you think the horse is too big for Joan. But probably it’s more nearly the kind of horse the real Joan rode, than a smaller one would be. I told you war-horses had to be big and strong to carry the men in armor and to charge through the enemy and it’s very likely that when Joan took command of the army she was given a man’s warhorse to ride. Before fire engines became automobiles they used to be pulled by large and beautiful horses. The horse that Mrs. Huntington used as a model for her statue was a fire engine horse in Gloucester, Massachusetts. 
The Huntington Joan of Arc stands on Riverside Drive in New York City. Do you like it as well as Frémiet’s Joan of Arc? I like it better. 
The other woman sculptor I want you to know is Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. Mrs. Whitney won the competition for a monument in memory of the people who were drowned when the Titanic sank. The Titanic was a great new ocean liner. On her first trip across the Atlantic she ran upon an iceberg and tore a hole in her bottom. She sank before other ships could reach her and more than fifteen hundred people were lost. The memorial designed by Mrs. Whitney shows a human figure standing erect with arms outstretched like cross. It was made to be placed in Washington, D. C. 
And now for Buffalo Bill! Yes, the famous Buffalo Bill, the daring Western scout, has an equestrian statue in his honor. Buffalo Bill’s real name was William Cody, Colonel William Cody later, and the statue of Buffalo Bill stands in the little town of Cody, Wyoming, which Buffalo Bill founded. The statue, made by Mrs. Whitney, shows Buffalo Bill looking down into a valley signaling with his rifle to the wagon train that he is guiding through the Indian country. Where the statue stands in Cody, however, there is no valley right below and so perhaps Buffalo Bill is looking at the hoof prints of an Indian war party on the trail beside him. Maybe you prefer to think of him as looking at still something else. 
 
No.58-2　BUFFALO BILL（《巴法羅·比爾》）　WHITNEY（惠特尼　制） 
Photograph by Ewing Galloway 
It’s a very good statue. The horse was modeled from one of Buffalo Bill’s own horses. 
But though I’ve mentioned only two women sculptors, remember there are many more women who are making excellent statues, especially in the United States.