artist.shtml biography paul-manship

Artist Name

birth12/24/1885 in St. Paul, MNPicture of Paul Manship
death1/28/1966 in New York, NY
parentsCharles H. Manship and Maty Etta Friend
educationMechanic Arts High School
Saint Paul School of Art
Art Students League, New York
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia
awardsAmerican Prix de Rome, 1909

Born on Christmas in St. Paul, Minnesota, to Mary Etta Friend (1844-1907) and Charles H. Manship (1843-1911), Paul Howard Manship considered it a good omen that he was the seventh child of a seventh daughter. He began to draw in emulation of his sister Adeline (1874-1893), but it was particularly his brother Luther (1879-1931) who served as an example. Luther earned his living as an engraver though his main interest was painting. Manship began his formal study of art at the Mechanic Arts High School and the Saint Paul School of Art (later the Saint Paul Institute of Arts and Sciences) in Minnesota. His initial decision to pursue a career as a sculptor was largely motivated by his color blindness; he had started out life as a painter. For a painter color blindness is obviously a severe handicap, but for a sculptor it might prove an advantage: the eye, not being distracted by color, could concentrate on form. Indeed, a great sensitivity to form, to contour, and to line was to prove one of Manship's major strengths.

By the age of nineteen, Paul Manship had saved enough from his work as a freelance illustrator and designer to head for New York City where he immediately enrolled at the Art Students League. His sculpture teacher there was Hermon Atkins MacNeil (1866-1947), the first of several sculptors trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts with whom Manship was to study. Soon after his arrival in New York, Manship also found a position as an assistant to Solon Borglum (1868-1922), who was working on two major equestrian monument commissions at the time. During his apprenticeship with Borglum, Manship worked almost exclusively on animal figures, developing proficiency with this subject that would serve him well on later commissions. Manship always credited Borglum as the master who had most influenced him. It was also through the Borglum family that Manship met his future wife, Isabel McIlwaine (1883-1874), a student of William Merritt Chase (1849-1916) and a teacher of art at the Hannah Moore School in Baltimore, Maryland.

With money he had saved from working with Borglum, Manship signed up for classes under Charles Grafly (1862-1929) at the prestigious Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia from 1907-08. When he later moved back to New York, Manship found a job as studio assistant to the Viennese sculptor Isidore Konti (1862-1930). While working in Konti's studio, Manship modeled a decorative relief entitled Man with Wild Horses. He was to show this piece at the National Academy of Design in 1908. This important early plaster had been considered lost until recent years when it was rediscovered and finally cast in bronze. This relief reflects Paul Manship's early mastery of the American academic tradition, before he traveled to Rome and developed his more modern, streamlined style of sculpture.

In 1909, at the age of twenty-three, Manship became the youngest sculptor as yet awarded the American Prix de Rome. By the first decade of the twentieth century, the Prix de Rome had become the most competitive and coveted prize among young American artists. The minimal requirements of this three-year fellowship afforded recipients opportunities to travel through Italy and Greece to study original works on site and in person. The conferral of this honor should be acknowledged as the one event that most closely directed Manship's career. As a result of his studies abroad, Manship developed an affinity for archaic and pre-classical works, and ultimately, the unified linear style of sculpture for which he is well known. His novel approach represented an abrupt break from the popular Beaux-Arts sculptural style of his teachers MacNeil, Borglum, and Grafly.

When Paul returned to New York in the fall of 1912, there was much for him to do. His years in Rome permitted him the leisure to study, work, and to mature in a rich cultural environment, and one where all his economic needs had been met. It was during this time that he evolved into an artist, producing work that was distinctively his own. But now that he was back in New York, earning a living had become a high priority. He had to find a studio and a place to live, and he had to make arrangements for his wedding. He took a studio at 27 Lexington Avenue, at the corner of Twenty- third Street then married Isabel at Grace Church on January 1, 1913, where Paul's funeral was to be held in 1966. In February Manship had a solo exhibition of his new work at the Architectural League in New York. This body of work was an instant success with both critics and the public, resulting in many private and public commissions. This success was followed by two more exhibitions in November, and by the end of the year Paul became father to Pauline Frances Manship. Thus, Manship's professional career and personal life moved briskly forward that year. His growing public appeal can be measured by the response to a show at the Berlin Photographic Company in which almost one hundred pieces were sold. His peers honored his achievement as well with a gold medal at the San Francisco Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915.

The Manships were a prosperous young couple, socially on the rise in 1915, and their new home and studio at Washington Mews in Manhattan were ideal for entertaining. Manship was a hard worker, but he also played hard. He joined a number of clubs: the National Arts Club; the Players Club; the Coffee House; and his favorite, the Century Club. During the next three summers the family was unable to travel in Europe due to the war so they rented a house in Cornish, New Hampshire, where they participated in the art colony that Saint-Gaudens had helped establish there. Manship also came to know some of the intellectual and artistic elite of Boston, such as Denman Ross of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, as a result of an exhibition at the Saint Botolph Club. Ross invited Manship to a luncheon with John Singer Sargent, who was eager to meet the sculptor of work that had impressed him on a visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. For Manship, this was an event of considerable importance.

Sargent was then perhaps the most celebrated painter in the world and his great reputation was equaled by a great generosity. Sargent and Manship soon developed a close rapport, despite the thirty-year difference in their ages, and over the years Sargent proved a good friend to the sculptor. Paul Manship was always fortunate in his friends. He made friends easily, and as a friend he was easy-going, undemanding, and profoundly loyal. During these early years of professional success he made a number of friendships that were to be of great importance to him, in some cases for the duration of his life. As a tribute to his deceased friend, the Manships later named their third child and only son John Paul (born 1927) for John Singer Sargent and for his father.

When his reputation in America was secure, Manship moved his family to London, England, where he worked in Sargent's studio during the summer of 1921. He then moved his family to Paris, where his second daughter Elizabeth Robinson was born. (As a grown woman, Elizabeth Manship Solomon distinguished herself as a fine painter, as well.) While Manship refreshed his imagination in the Mediterranean, exhibitions of his work continued in the United States. During this period, Grace Rainer Rogers asked Manship to create a memorial to her brother to be erected at the New York Zoological Park in the Bronx. Paul Rainey had been a big game hunter and animal collector who had trapped rare animals for the zoo until his death in 1925. Manship's innovative format - a set of monumental bronze gates that included a menagerie of animal figures - allowed him to fully explore and exploit the patterns created by the animal form. He also took great advantage of the decorative effect created by the negative spaces of the design.The animals he modeled for this project are wonderfully alive and rather humorous in their depictions of the distinct personalities of each species. Manship returned to many of these same animal figures in later years to fashion new compositions. His habit was to keep working at a theme until he got it right. Indian Hunter and his Dog, for instance, is the culmination of a long series of Indians, hunters, or Davids - partially nude young men with dogs at their sides, which were done over a period of more than ten years. The small version of The Indian Hunter with His Dog has always been one of his most popular pieces.

The Manships were blessed by the birth of their last child, Sarah Janet, in 1929 and were lucky to be well off during the long drought of the 1930s. Ironically, it was the stock market crash of 1929 that indirectly led to the creation of Manship's most celebrated sculpture, because the Depression gave birth to Rockefeller Center. Art was intended to play an important part in the complex and the theme chosen for the center was "New Frontiers and the March of Civilization." Times were bad, and the construction of such an ambitious project was a sign of faith in a prosperous future; art was to underline this message. Manship was never completely happy with the subject of Prometheus, which he was commissioned to represent and which ultimately became his signature work. From the beginning Prometheus attracted an enormous amount of attention and it was considered one of the best-known works of public art in this country next to the Statue of Liberty. Despite Paul's disappointment with this piece, it is characteristic of his art: the gravity-defying figure with its stylized details, the strongly rhythmic outline of the composition, even the ring of the zodiac are all essential elements of Manship's mature work.

Manship also was given one of the choicest sites on the main mall at New York's 1939 world's fair. Paul decided to create a monumental sundial with four sculptural groups signifying the times of day, set in a large reflecting pool. Time and the Fates Sundial and the four Moods of Time were in many ways Manship's favorite works. They summed up his obsession with time. He believed that a major purpose of art, especially of art in the classical tradition, was to reconcile the passage of time with permanence. The monumental groups, which were executed in staff (a plaster of Paris compound) for the world's fair, have been lost; but the working models of various sizes were done in bronze after the war, and they are among Manship's most ingenious, complex, and inventive works.

During the summer of 1943 Manship began looking at property to buy on Cape Ann. It was a good time to do so. The local granite quarries had closed, and the Rockport Granite Company was in bankruptcy; its only business was the liquidation of its real estate. Paul therefore had a wide choice and eventually purchased fourteen acres of quarry land in Lanesville, Massachusetts, across the street from the Natti's farmhouse and a short walk to the village, a distinct advantage during the war, when no one had a car. The property contained two handsome quarries filled with water, delightful for swimming in the summer and for skating in the winter. Because it was wartime, there was difficulty in acquiring building materials. When an old house in Pigeon Cove was offered for sale on the condition it be moved, Manship bought it and had it taken apart and rebuilt. The family moved into this house in the spring of 1945. It was then that Manship was able to buy a splendid oxen barn dating from the 1840s to use as a studio. Work on the Lanesville property continued through the 1950s. Manship made it a showcase for his sculpture, designing a terrace for his world's fair groups.

At the top of his profession, Manship was optimistic about his own role in the postwar world. Honors were bestowed on him from all over the world: corresponding membership in the Academia Nacional de las Bellas Artes in Argentina in 1944 and in the Academie des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1946, and membership in the oldest of the academies - l'Accademia di San Luca in Rome -in 1952. In the spring of 1945 he was awarded the gold medal for sculpture by the National Institute of Arts and Letters and given a retrospective exhibition in its handsome galleries. Manship was elected the president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1948, and in 1950 he was elected president of the Century Club. When it was possible to travel again after the war, Manship established a routine that he would follow for the rest of his life. At some time during the year he would make a trip to Europe, going to Florence to work at the Bearzi Foundry, to Rome to stop at the Academy, and often to Paris to visit old friends, especially architect Welles Bosworth. During the warm seasons he would travel back and forth to Lanesville, but unfortunately his asthma made it impossible for him to stay there long. After two or three weeks he would have to hurry back to New York to recover in its impure but pollenless air. The rest of the time he spent working in his New York studio. He rarely used his great studio in Lanesville, except for small pieces.

Surprisingly, Manship did very little religious sculpture during his long career. A St. Joseph marble statue, commissioned by C. Grant LaFarge (1862-1938, the son of the great painter John Lafarge) for a church in Providence, Rhode Island, was the only work of consequence he was to do in this genre. It's unclear why this should have been. He was not himself a church-going man, but this shouldn't have made a difference. He certainly was very sensitive to the great tradition of religious art. Perhaps he didn't get church commissions because he didn't seek them out and because he became known for a different type of sculpture. Ecclesiastical art is something of a specialty, and the sculptors of his generation who worked extensively in the field tended to do little else. It is too bad in a way, as he very much enjoyed the challenge of working in many genres.

Paul Manship did commissioned work during his later years, but he also worked on a number of pieces for his own pleasure, including a series of small bronzes modeled originally in wax and cast by the lost-wax process. He had begun doing these works, which he called his "pet creations," in the 1930s, modeling figures in wax the way someone else might knit or do crossword puzzles. He carried a cigar box of wax and toothpicks to use as armatures, especially on his frequent transatlantic flights. He experimented with all types of subjects, often using a semiprecious stone as a base, and the work was done with the freedom and assurance that result from half a century of experience. These pieces are like lyric poems and are probably Manship's most deeply personal works; he was very reluctant to sell any of them. The series was almost intact when he died and was divided mainly between the two museums that were his principal beneficiaries

Manship rarely entered competitions for commissions, and when he did he was rarely successful. However, as president and member of numerous art organizations and government advisory committees, Paul Manship used his authority to elevate the public standard of taste at a time when fine craftsmanship was being sacrificed to commercialism and machine-age technology. While a member of the Smithsonian Art Commission for over twenty-five years, he lobbied to ensure that sculpture continued to play an integral role in the decoration of public buildings and grounds. He received many honors during his lifetime, the two most important being membership in the French Legion of Honor and election to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Despite his former popularity, Manship's fame faded after World War II when commercial tastes in sculpture changed to favor abstraction over representational art. Manship believed that for sculpture to be effective it must reflect the deepest ideals of a society rather than simply the personal ideas of the artist. His dissatisfaction with sculpture in his later years was that he felt it didn't attempt to express anything meaningful to any but a small, self-appointed elite. He continued to produce works that are considered masterpieces of sculpture and to receive important public commissions, but news of these achievements went unnoticed in the press.

Throughout art history, the most unlikely reputations have been revived: John Singer Sargent was vilified after his death, and it took more than thirty years for the wheel of fashion to turn back to him. And so too, Manship's reputation started to improve in the early 1980s, heralded by a rise in auction prices, and the revival has continued steadily ever since. John once compared his father's position in American twentieth-century sculpture with that of Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres in French art of the nineteenth. Both had studied in Rome and never escaped from its influence: in their old age, both had set themself against radical tendencies, a stance that led them to be criticized and abused. But now Ingres's greatness is recognized, as we will also come to recognize Manship's. Paul Manship believed it is essential for a sculptor to be complete by exercising his talents in all genres. He tried almost everything, and even when his work was unsuccessful it was distinctively his own, for his style united all his disparate inventions. That style, which began in eclecticism and passed through the stylization of Art Deco, was distilled at the end into a personal expression of the classical tradition.

 

Unknown origin

New Netherland Tercentenary 1914
by Paul Manship
COF-11.1
Tan-gold patina

The medal's obverse bears a figure representing New York, seated on a throne, holding burning torch in one hand, skyscraper in other. Around, TERCENTENARY / NEW YORK / 1914.

The reverse depicts the ship New Netherland which brought the first settlers to New Amsterdam in 1623, flanked by Dutchman with musket and Native American with bow and peace pipe; beaver below. Around, NEW NETHERLAND FOUNDED / 1614.

This medal is the eleventh issue in the prestigious and highly collectible Circle of Friends of the Medallion series.

References: Marqusee 253

COF-11.1
Bronze
70.0mm (2.76in)
Tan-gold patina
CIRCLE OF FRIENDS
DAVISON PHILA.
Kultur in Belgium1918
PM-KIB
Bronze

The obverse bears bust of Kaiser Wilhelm II with necklace of skulls and iron cross; rifle with bayonett to left. Around, THE FOE OF FREE PEOPLES; below, HIS / ROSARY.

The reverse bears German soldier abducting helpless Belgian woman, callously stepping over child on ground. Around, KULTUR IN BELGIUM; below, MURDER PILLAGE.

The edge is marked MEDALLIC ART CO. N.Y.

This medal was clearly a response to German artist Karl Goetz' satirical war medals which depicted the allied side in a bad light. Goetz' medals were reviled by the Allies and caused a huge backlash, particularly his infamous Lusitania medal. Artistically, Goetz was on the leading edge of realism while French, British, and American sculptors were still depicting war in terms of carefully crafted Art Nouveau imagery, the horror of war often represented by an angel of death, a weeping widow or a cemetery.

Manship obviously decided that Goetz' medals deserved retaliation in kind. His medal is a true masterpiece of propaganda art, yet it was received with some ambivalence. The June, 1918 issue of the American Magazine of Arts reported:

"In some of the shop windows on Fifth Avenue, New York, is now to be seen a bronze medal designed and executed by Paul Manship representing the outrages perpetrated by the German army upon women and children in invaded territory, particularly in Belgium. This is offered for sale at $10.00 a piece and puts into permanent form those things which if possible should not be remembered, but if remembered not visualized."

The medal measures 66.2mm (2 5/8in) in diameter and was struck in bronze by the Medallic Art Company of New York.

References: Murtha 103; Baxter 365

City of Detroit Memorial1919
PM-CDM
Bronze

The obverse bears a winged female figure representing Victory striding forward to the left, holding a sword wrapped in a palm leaf; a radiant sun in the background. Around: VIXIT - VIVIT - VIVET (Lived, Conquered, Shall Live).

The reverse bears a scroll with fasces behind at center, inscribed: IN MEMORY/ OF ONE WHO/ DIED IN THE/ CAUSE OF/ FREEDOM AND/ HUMANITY. Above, an eagle holding a laurel wreath perches atop the end of a cannon and ball. Around: PRESENTED BY THE CITY OF DETROIT - 1919.

The Society of Arts and Crafts, Detroit, issued memorial medals in 1919 that were given by the City of Detroit to the families of men who lost their lives in the Great War. Only 900 medals were struck.

An earlier version of this medal, with a less evolved obverse design, is in the Smithsonian Art Museum Collection.

Art Directors' Club Award1921
PM-ADC
Bronze

The obverse bears Art Deco image of Bellerophon with lyre riding winged pegasus above sun. Around, ART DIRECTORS CLUB / INCORPORATED 1920.

The reverse bears painter with palette and brush in center. Around center, AWARDED FOR SPECIAL MERIT. Around edge, laurel wreath with (PM monogram) at bottom.

The edge is marked MEDALLIC ART CO. N.Y.

Louis Pedlar founded the Art Directors' Club of New York in 1920 in response to the uncertain relationship between advertising art and fine art. Pedlar assembled a group of art buyers, art department managers and layout artists to ponder whether advertising art could be judged by the same stringent standards as fine art.

Obviously the answer was "yes" because Paul Manship was asked to create a medal to be used as an award. Awards were given annually in the areas of black-and-white illustration, color illustration, oil painting, and poster art, though not always in all areas.

An article published in Printers' Ink Monthly outlines the process that was used:

"All mediums were given consideration; black-and-white, flat color, oil painting and decorative design. A rigid standard of selection was enforced, and the 300 pictures shown, selected from many thousands submitted, represented the best there is in advertiding design.

Both the organization and the award still exist but the medal was replaced by a modern cube in the 1970's.

The medal measures 54mm (2 1/8in) in diameter and were manufactured by the Medallic Art Company of New York.

Hail to Dionysus 1930
by Paul Manship
SOM-2.1
Saddle brown patina
SOM-2.2
Deep hematite red patina
SOM-2.4
Silver

This medal was chosen as the 2nd issue of the prestigious Society of Medalists series. The obverse bears a grape-crowned, bearded god of wine over shallow, two-handled kylix. Around, in two lines, HAIL - TO - DIONYSUS - WHO - FIRST - DISCOVERED / THE - MAGIC - OF - THE - GRAPE. The reverse bears youthful satyrs trampling grapes. Below, signed © / .P.MANSHIP 1930.

Manship's medal proved to be highly controversial and thus provided much needed publicity for the still young Society of Medalists. America was still nominally observing Prohibition and at least one member is reported to have resigned over this "glorification of wine."

The medal measures 73mm in diameter. The Medallic Art Company of New York struck a reported 1,950 medals in bronze and 50 in silver.

References: Marqusee 256

All that being said, this medal in bronze typically trades on eBay between $180 and $230. Silver variants come up very rarely and can fetch several hundred dollars, typically in the $400 to $1,000 range.

SOM-2.1
Bronze
73mm (2.75in)
Saddle brown patina
THE SOCIETY OF MEDALISTS SECOND ISSUE
MEDALLIC ART CO.N.Y.
SOM-2.2
Bronze
73mm (2.75in)
Deep hematite red patina
THE SOCIETY OF MEDALISTS SECOND ISSUE
MEDALLIC ART CO.N.Y. BRONZE
SOM-2.3
Bronze
73mm (2.75in)
Glossy graphite brown patina
THE SOCIETY OF MEDALISTS SECOND ISSUE
MEDALLIC ART CO.-DANBURY,CT.-BRONZE
SOM-2.4
Silver
73mm (2.75in)
THE SOCIETY OF MEDALISTS SECOND ISSUE - ONE OF LIMITED ISSUE OF 700
MEDALLIC ART CO.N.Y. - .999+ PURE SILVER
Southern Railway System Centennial 1930
PM-SRS
Bronze

The obverse bears running locomotive with figure of Mercury flying overhead and carrying tray with fruit and bottle; sun rays with date "1930" in background; bolts of lightning emerging from train wheels; all within beaded border; surrounding legend SOUTHERN RAILWAY SYSTEM CENTENNIAL / South Carolina 1830 Virginia 1831 Alabama 1832.

The reverse bears cornucopia at center with legend COTTON CORN TOBACCO; all within beaded border; surrounding legend A CENTURY OF SERVICE CARRYING TO MARKET THE FRUITS OF THE EARTH.

This is one of the iconic American medals and is a part of many museum collections, including the Metropolitan Museum in New York.

The medal is struck in bronze and measures 89mm (3 1/2in) in diameter.

Franklin D. Roosevelt - First Inauguration Medal1933
PM-FDR.1
Gold-plated Bronze
PM-FDR.2
Bronze

The obverse bears profile of Roosevelt, facing left. Around, in two lines, · FRANKLIN · DELANO · ROOSEVELT · - · 31ST · PRESIDENT · OF · THE · UNITED · STATES / · 1933 · · 1937 · - · JOHN · NANCE · GARNER · VICE · PRESIDENT; signed under truncation, PMANSHIP ©

The reverse bears U.S.S. Constitution heading left above winged female in flight, surrounded by beaded border. Around, : THOU · TOO · SAIL · ON · O · SHIP · OF · STATE : SAIL · ON · O · UNION · STRONG · AND · GREAT

Roosevelt's profile is modeled in such high relief that it took 12 strikes from the great presses at the Mint to render the finer details. Roosevelt himself apparently suggested the "Old Ironsides" motif for the reverse. Manship placed the winfed female figure underneath to represent the modern day "Ship of State."

I do not have many U.S. Mint medals in my collection, but this one is really quite handsome. According to Joe Levine, many collectors believe this to be the handsomest of all bronze inauguration medals.

The medal measures 76.2mm (2 5/8in) in diameter and was struck in bronze by the U.S. Mint. The mintage was 1500. The second variant represents medals struck by the Medallic Art Company. Apparently, the dies for this medal were fabricated at the Medallic Art Company in New York and approximately 50 medals were struck there before the dies were sent to the U.S. Mint.

Many thanks to a collector who wishes to remain anonymous for telling me about and sending me picturesof the Medallic Art variant.

References: Marqusee 254; Murtha 332

U.S. Mint
Gold-plated Bronze
76.2mm
 
MACo
Bronze
76.2mm
MEDALLIC ART CO.N.Y. BRONZE
Saint George - American Eagle Medal1941
by Mario Korbel & Paul Manship
UWS
Bronze

The medal's obverse, designed by Mario Korbel, bears St. George slaying a dragon with Swastika on its wing. Around, ·· SAINT GEORGE ·· / OF ENGLAND; signed under dragon, MK

The reverse, designed by Paul Manship, bears a displayed American Eagle flanked by two stars. Around, · UNITED · WE · STAND · / · AMERICA ·; signed under eagles foot on right, PM

This medal was issued for the British-American Ambulance Corps. A companion piece executed entirely by Korbel combined this obverse with a reverse utilizing a thumbs-up — forward to victory motif.

The circular medal measures 38.5mm in diameter and is holed for supension.

James Hazen Hyde Medallion1948
PM-JHH
Bronze with olive patina

The obverse bears bust of Hyde facing right. Around top, · JAMES · H · HYDE ·; to left, JUNE 6 / 1876; at bottom, · 1948 ·; signed under truncation, PAUL MANSHIP · SCULP

The reverse bears four heads representing the The Four Continents: Minerva in Grecian helmet, Balinese dancer in crown, American Indian with feathered Mohawk, African head with stacked neck rings inspired by the Ife Bronzes; boldly beaded border around heads.

The edge is marked MEDALLIC ART CO. N.Y. BRONZE

James Hazen Hyde (1876-1959) was at the center of the first great Wall Street scandal when opponents including such notables as J.P. Morgan, E.H. Harriman and Henry Clay Frick tried to remove him from control of The Equitable, the company his father had founded. While the public smear campaign against him was largely based on untruths, it caused him great social troubles. He eventually divested himself of his businesses and left the United States for Paris to focus on other interests.

One of his great passions was history. He assembled what is probably the most comprehensive and diversified collection of decorative art objects, tapestries, prints and drawings tracing the theme of the Allegory of the Four Parts of the World (or the Four Continents) from the mid-sixteenth to the late nineteenth century. While the collection was divided up among several museums, the bulk of it remains in New York and resides at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the New York Historical Society, the Cooper-Hewitt Museum, and the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Many thanks to a collector who wishes to remain anonymous for sending me the images.

The medallion measures 89.3mm in diameter and was struck in bronze by the Medallic Art Company of New York.

References: MACo 1948-029

"Day" Medal1985
PM-DAY
Bronze

The obverse bears medallic representation of Paul Manship's famous "Day" sculpture. Under image, PAUL MANSHIP / "DAY"

The reverse bears facade of Equitable Center in perspective. To left and right, 19 - 85; below, EQUITABLE / CENTER

Paul Manship created several sculptures for the 1939 New York World's Fair, including the largest sundial in the world, Time and the Fates. Near this piece were placed four statues representing the times of day: Morning, Day, Evening, and Night. In these sculptures, Manship's flying figures expressed the rush toward a bright future promised to all Americans at the fair. The sculpture Day shows the sun god Helios racing forward with "energy, radiation, and speed" accompanied by two of his fiery steeds.

This medal obviously post-dates Manship's death and in particular the reverse has nothing to do with him. Nevertheless, the medal's obverse is very handsome and wins it a spot on this great sculptor's page.

The medal measures 64mm in diameter and does not bear any hallmarks.

Contact me if you have links that might merit inclusion on this page.

Books & Articles

American Art Medals, 1909-1995 by David Thomason Alexander
David T. Alexander's book can be purchased at the above link. Highly recommended for anyone interested in SOM. I am deeply indebted to him for all the information I used to document the SOM medals on this site.

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