Photos 15 Jul 2007 07:28 am
Sunday Statue Photos
- Like most cities, New York is rich in statues. There are plenty of them in the parks, but there are others on the streets and outside buildings.
On my daily excursion from home to studio I see a lot of the same statues, and I thought today I’d feature some of these. For the most part they all fall into the same school, what I’ll call early twentieth century representational. They all honor some hero or other.
The entrance to Madison Square Park, at 23rd Street and Broadway, has a
large statue celebrating William Steward. He was Lincoln’s Secretary of
State, a former Senator and anti-slavery advocate. He was part of Booth’s
conspiracy to kill off Lincoln and other members of his cabinet and was___
stabbed in the throat that same night. ______________________________
He eventually recovered to serve under Andrew Johnson._______________
_______________
__ 
left: William Seward ___ right: David Glasgow Farragut
David G. Farragut was one of the most colorful naval commanders of the
Civil War. Though he was unsuccessful in early naval operations against
Vicksburg, Farragut’s success at New Orleans and Mobile Bay secured his
place in history as one of America’s most celebrated heroes.
__
Chester K. Arthur, the twenty-first President of the United States (1881-1885)
He stands at the Madison Avenue, 26th Street entrance to the park.
__
The east side of Union Square Park at 16th Street features this large and beautiful statue which is surrounded by tables where people can carry treats from the open market and rest. I haven’t yet found a plaque telling what the statue represents, but it looks to be
derivative of Daumier’s beautiful painting of a mother with her children. __________
__
Gandhi stands, almost hidden, at a side entrance to
Union Square Park at 15th Street and University Place.
___
You can see that he stands almost hidden among the grass, flowers and weeds.
on 15 Jul 2007 at 3:06 pm 1.Eddie fitzgerald said …
I love park statues and I envy you for being able to walk to work in places where you can see them. I like the heroic mother and her children best. Super-realistic statues in natural poses aren’t as satisfying as the iconic ones.
on 15 Jul 2007 at 5:42 pm 2.Masako said …
Even surrounded by the everyday bubbub, the Ghandi statue always seems to emit serenity. It is often decorated by flowers, presumably from someone paying the respects. This is where I slow down and ponder, however briefly, about not-so-everyday life matters.
on 15 Jul 2007 at 6:00 pm 3.Larry Ruppel said …
I’ve always loved the William Seward statue because of the bizarre fact that the lazy sculptor had an extra body of Abraham Lincoln lying around and merely plopped Seward’s head on top. He figured, rightly so, that nobody knew what Seward looked like anyway. No one seems to have noticed.
By the way, I learned this from that wonderful PBS walking tour series “A Walk Up Broadway” with David Hartman and Historian Barry Lewis.
on 15 Jul 2007 at 8:15 pm 4.Mac said …
I’ve always admired the woman and children statue as well as the Gandhi statue. Thanks for the bit of history about the statues of those other men, some interesting stuff.