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The Ellen Phillips Samuel Memorial Sculpture
Garden (1933-1961) is located at Kelly Drive
along the Schuylkill River, south of Girard
Avenue Bridge.
The Fairmount Park Art
Association established and maintains the
Ellen Phillips Samuel Memorial Sculpture
Garden. The memorial includes three terraces
and seventeen sculptures that were commissioned
over thirty years. Ellen Phillips Samuel
was a member of the Fairmount Park Art Association
and a supporter of many cultural activities
in Philadelphia. When she died in 1913,
she left the bulk of her estate in trust
to the Art Association, specifying that
the income be used to create a series of
sculptural monuments "emblematic of
the history of America." When these
funds became available upon the death of
her husband in 1929, the Art Association
appointed a planning committee, which decided
that the Samuel Memorial should express
major ideas and spiritual forces as well
as chronological developments in American
history.
To identify sculptors,
the committee organized three international
exhibitions at the Philadelphia Museum of
Art. These Sculpture Internationals, in
1933, 1940, and 1949, brought together the
works of hundreds of sculptors from the
United States and abroad. The exhibitions
contributed not only to the Samuel Memorial
but also to the general awareness of contemporary
sculpture throughout the Philadelphia area.
The committee completed
its work with the dedication of the Samuel
Memorial in 1961. Since then, two notable
changes have been made. John J. Boyle's
Stone
Age in America (1887) was relocated
in 1985 from the Sweetbriar Mansion area
to a location just south of the South Terrace,
where it expands on the Memorial's sculptural
evocation of American history. And Jacques
Lipchitz's The
Spirit of Enterprise, (1950-1960)
originally on the North Terrace, was moved
to the Central Terrace in 1986 to increase
its visibility.
Central
Terrace
Construction of the Memorial began with
the Central Terrace. Six sculptors were
commissioned to create two large bronze
monuments and four complementary figures
in limestone. These works express the twin
themes of America's westward expansion and
the new nation's welcome to immigrants from
other lands.
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Maurice
Sterne (1878-1957),
Welcoming to Freedom (1939).
Bronze, on granite base
Height 13'4" (base 3'1")
Photo: Gary McKinnis |
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J.
Wallace Kelly (1894-1976),
The Ploughman (1938).
Limestone, on limestone base
Height 5'1" (base 5'7")
Photo: Gary McKinnis
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John
B. Flannagan (1895-1942),
The Miner (1938).
Limestone, on limestone base
Height 5' (base 5'6")
Photo: Howard Brunner
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Helene
Sardeau (1899-1968),
The Slave (1940).
Limestone, on limestone base
Height 5'5" (base 5'6")
Photo: Howard Brunner
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Heinz
Warneke (1895-1983),
The Immigrant (1940).
Limestone, on limestone base
Height 5'9" (base 5'6")
Photo: Gary McKinnis
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Jacques
Lipchitz (1891-1973),
The
Spirit of Enterprise (1950-1960).
Bronze, on granite base
Height 10'5"; length 14'10"
(base height 4'8")
Photo: Howard Brunner
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South
Terrace
After the second Sculpture International
in 1940, the committee selected four sculptors
to express the governing themes of the new
South Terrace—the settlement of the
eastern coast and the emergence of the United
States as an independent, democratic nation.
The two principal groups were carved as
reliefs, the other four sculptures as free-standing
figures.
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Wheeler
Williams (1897-1972), Settling
of the Seaboard (1942).
Limestone, on granite base
Height 12'1" (base 3')
Photo: Gary McKinnis
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Henry
Kreis (1899-1963),
The Birth of a Nation (1943).
Limestone, on granite base
Height 12'1" (base 3')
Photo: Rick Echelmeyer
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Harry
Rosin (1897-1973),
The Puritan (L) and The
Quaker (R)
(1942).
Limestone, on granite bases
Height 8'4" (bases 4'7")
Photo: Rick Echelmeyer
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Erwin
Frey (1892-1967),
The Revolutionary Soldier (L) and
The Statesman (R) (1943).
Limestone, on granite bases
Height 8'4" (bases 4'8",
4'6")
Photo: Rick Echelmeyer
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North
Terrace
The development of the North Terrace inaugurated
the final stage of the Samuel Memorial.
Here, the intention was to express not historical
periods or movements but rather the spiritual,
intellectual, and physical "inner energies"
that shaped the nation.
Two major bronze groups
were to represent "social consciousness"
and "constructive enterprise,"
and the commissions were offered to Jacob
Epstein and Jacques Lipchitz. As Epstein
and Lipchitz progressed, it became apparent
that their two massive monuments would not
fit comfortably in the same terrace. Thus
Epstein's Social Consciousness
never became part of the Samuel Memorial;
rather, it was installed at the western
entrance of the Art Museum. Lipchitz's The
Spirit of Enterprise served as the
centerpiece of the North Terrace until in
1986 it was moved to the Central Terrace
to increase its visibility from Kelly Drive.
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Waldemar
Raemisch (1888-1955), The Preacher
(1952).
Granite, on granite base
Height 8'2" (base 3'10")
Photo: Rick Echelmeyer
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José
de Creeft (1884-1982),
The Poet (1954).
Granite, on granite base
Height 8'6" (base 3'10")
Photographer unknown
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Koren
der Harootian (1909-1991), The
Scientist (1955).
Granite, on granite base
Height 8'6" (base 3'10")
Photographer unknown
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Ahron Ben-Shmuel (1903-1984),
The Laborer (1958).
Granite, on granite base
Height 8'6" (base 3'10")
Photo: Gary McKinnis
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J.
Wallace Kelly (1894-1976),
Titles Unknown: Eye (L) and
Hand (R) (relief panels) (1959).
Limestone, on granite base
Height 6'3" (base 2'1")
Photos: Howard Brunner
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