The George D. Widener Memorial Gold Medal was a prestigious sculpture prize awarded by the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from 1913 to 1968. Established in 1912, it recognized the "most meritorious work of Sculpture modeled by an American citizen and shown in the Annual Exhibition." PAFA's annual exhibitions were open to all American sculptors, but an individual could be awarded the medal only once. Sculptors Paul Manship, Albin Polasek, Malvina Hoffman, Carl Paul Jennewein, Anna Hyatt Huntington, William Zorach and Leonard Baskin were among its recipients.

George Dunton Widener had been a Philadelphia businessman and a director of PAFA. He and his son Harry died in 1912 aboard the RMS Titanic.

The Widener Gold Medal was retired in 1968. Beginning in 1969, PAFA devoted its annual exhibitions solely to work by students in its school.

List of Recipients

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Year Sculptor Image Work Medium Collection Notes
1913 Charles Grafly Head of Thomas Pollock Anshutz[1] bronze Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
1914 Paul Manship   Duck Girl bronze Rittenhouse Square, Philadelphia
1915 Albin Polasek Aspiration[2][3] bronze Detroit Institute of Arts A seated female nude holding musical pipes and kissing a cherub.
1916 Edward McCartan The Spirit of the Woods[4] bronze "Welwyn" (Harold Pratt estate),
Glen Cove, Long Island, New York
A nude female figure dancing with a baby.
Another example is at the Mead Art Museum at Amherst College.
1917 Attilio Piccirilli   The Flower of the Alps marble A bronze version was auctioned at Sotheby's NY, October 2, 2015.[5]
1918 Albert Laessle   Penguins[6] bronze Philadelphia Zoo,
West Fairmount Park, Philadelphia
Other examples are at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Brookgreen Gardens,[7] and elsewhere.
1919 Jess M. Lawson
(later Jess Lawson Peacey)
  Belgium, 1914 First woman sculptor awarded the Widener Gold Medal.
Also awarded the 1918 Barnett Prize from the National Academy of Design.
1920 Malvina Hoffman   The Offering[8] bronze Glenbow Museum,
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
1921 Evelyn Beatrice Longman The Future[9][10] bronze Nashville Parthenon,
Centennial Park, Nashville, Tennessee
A standing female nude.
Also awarded the 1918 Shaw Prize from the National Academy of Design, and the 1919 French Gold Medal from the Art Institute of Chicago.
1922 Beatrice Fenton   A Sea-Weed Fountain[11] bronze Horticultural Hall,
West Fairmount Park, Philadelphia
 
Another example is at Brookgreen Gardens.
1923 Brenda Putnam Sea Horse Sundial[12][13] bronze Private collection, Williamstown, Massachusetts Also awarded the 1922 Barnett Prize from the National Academy of Design.
1924 Arthur Lee Volupté[14][15]
Voluptuousness
marble Metropolitan Museum of Art Other examples are at the Brooklyn Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, the Yale University Art Gallery, and in private collections.
1925 Walker Hancock Toivo[16][17] bronze St. Louis Art Museum A bust of a Finnish youth.
Another bronze example is at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
1926 Adolph Alexander Weinman Narcissus[18][19] bronze Norton Museum of Art,
West Palm Beach, Florida
A marble example is at Brookgreen Gardens.[20]
1927 Katherine Lane Weems Narcisse Noir[21][22]
Black Whippet
bronze Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Other examples are at the Reading Public Museum and the Museum of Science (Boston).
1928 Albert Stewart Silver King Polar Bear[23] silvered bronze Metropolitan Museum of Art Also awarded the 1927 Speyer Prize from the National Academy of Design.
1929 Bruce Moore Black Panther[24][25] bronze Smithsonian American Art Museum Other examples are at the Whitney Museum, and elsewhere.
1930 Mitchell Fields   Torso (Naomi} marble Wilfrid Israel Museum,
Hazorea, Israel
1931 Gladys Edgerly Bates Eve
1932 Carl Paul Jennewein   Indian and Eagle[26]
Monument to the American Dead
gilded bronze
plaster
Tours War Memorial,
Tours, France
 
The sculpture is the centerpiece of a fountain.
Jennewein's plaster model is at the Pérez Art Museum Miami.[27]
Another bronze example is at Brookgreen Gardens.[28]
1933 John Gregory Lyric Love[29][30]
Monument for an Aviator's Grave
Carrara marble Armstrong Browning Library,
Baylor University, Waco, Texas
A winged female figure, partially nude.
1934 Concetta Scaravaglione Mother and Child[31] plaster Virginia Museum of Fine Arts,
Richmond, Virginia
1935 Heinz Warneke Wild Boars[32] marble Smithsonian American Art Museum Another marble example is unlocated.
1936 Vincent Glinsky The Awakening[33][34] marble Brookgreen Gardens A female nude reclining on a rock.
1937 Anna Hyatt Huntington Greyhounds Playing[35] bronze Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
1938 Anthony de Francisci Gilda, the Artist's Daughter[36][37] plaster Smithsonian American Art Museum Bas relief head.
1939 Harry Rosin Eugenie Philadelphia Museum of Art Head of a Tahitian model.
1940 Carl L. Schmitz   (Model for) Foreign Trade[38][39] painted plaster Smithsonian American Art Museum
 
Foreign Trade is a limestone relief panel on the exterior of the Federal Trade Commission Building, Washington, D.C.[40]
1941 Dorothea Greenbaum Tiny[41] bronze Institute for Advanced Study,
Princeton, New Jersey
A standing female nude.
1942 Janet de Coux Deborah's Song
1943 Henry Kreis[42]   The Birth of a Nation[43] limestone Ellen Phillips Samuel Memorial Sculpture Garden,
Fairmount Park, Kelly Drive, Philadelphia
Located along the east bank of the Schuylkill River.
1944 Cecil de Blaquiere Howard[44]   American Youth Plaster Private collection Cecil Howard posing in US Army uniform in his New York studio in 1944, before his departure for London with the OSS. He stands by his daughter Line's portrait bust and "American Youth," also entitled "The Sacrifice," his sculpture symbolyzing the American Army's entry into war.
1945 José de Creeft Head of Rachmaninoff[45][46] lead Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
1946 Waldemar Raemisch Pietà
1947 Adolph Dioda Crucifix
1948 Herbert Lewis Kammerer Head and Shoulders with Bent Arms
1949 Mitzi Solomon
(later Mitzi Cunliffe)
A Voluptuous Object pink marble
1950 Hugo Robus Dawn[47] plaster Fonderia Battaglia, Milan, Italy A life-size female nude yawning and stretching.
Bronze examples are in private collections.
1951 Oronzio Maldarelli   Bianca, No. 2[48] bronze Metropolitan Museum of Art Other examples are at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C., and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond.
1952 Jacques Lipchitz   Prometheus Strangling the Vulture[49] bronze Philadelphia Museum of Art PMA bought Lipchitz's plaster model, and commissioned him to cast it in bronze, 1953.
Another example is at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.
1953 Anthony Lauck Monk at Prayer[50] limestone Butler Institute of American Art,
Youngstown, Ohio
Rev. Lauck was a Roman Catholic priest and an art instructor at the University of Notre Dame.[51]
1954 Koren Der Harootian Descent from the Cross
1955 Student exhibition
1956 Theodore Roszak Hound of Heaven[52][53] steel with nickel and copper Museum of Modern Art, New York City
1957 Student exhibition
1958 Kahlil Gibran Voice in the Wilderness[54][55] welded iron Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
1959 Student exhibition
1960 Lee Bontecou Bird[56] bronze Chase Manhattan Bank, New York City
1961 Student exhibition
1962 William Zorach   Puma[57] plaster University Gallery, University of Delaware,
Newark, Delaware
Other examples in bronze and granite are at Fairmount Park, Philadelphia; National Museum of Wildlife Art, Jackson Hole, Wyoming; and in private collections.
1963 Student exhibition
1964 Geraldine McCullough[58] Phoenix Other works include: Martin Luther King, Jr sculpture in Springfield, IL, Pathfinder in Oak Park, IL, and Our King, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Chicago, IL
1965 Student exhibition
1966 Leonard Baskin Seated Woman[59][60] carved oak Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
1967 Student exhibition
1968 Seymour Lipton Gateway[61] nickel and monel metal National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Thomas Anshutz, from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
  2. ^ Aspiration, from SIRIS.
  3. ^ Aspiration, from Albin Polacek Museum & Sculpture Garden.
  4. ^ Spirit of the Woods, from Christie's, 24 May 2007, Lot 8.
  5. ^ Flower of the Alps, from Sotheby's, 2 October 2015, Lot 75.
  6. ^ Penguins, from SIRIS.
  7. ^ Robin R. Salmon, Sculpture of Brookgreen Gardens.
  8. ^ The Offering, from SIRIS.
  9. ^ The Future, from SIRIS.
  10. ^ The Future
  11. ^ Seaweed Fountain, from SIRIS.
  12. ^ Sea Horse Sundial, from SIRIS.
  13. ^ Sea Horse Sundial is illustrated on p. 14: Ferargil Galleries, Sculpture for the Garden, exhibition catalogue (no date).[1] from Frick Art Reference Library.
  14. ^ Volupte, from SIRIS.
  15. ^ Volupté, from Metropolitan Museum of Art.
  16. ^ Toivo, from SIRIS.
  17. ^ Toivo, from Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
  18. ^ Narcissus, from SIRIS.
  19. ^ Narcissus, from Charleston Renaissance Gallery.
  20. ^ Narcissus, from SIRIS.
  21. ^ Narcisse Noir, from SIRIS.
  22. ^ Narcisse Noir, from Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
  23. ^ Silver King, from Metropolitan Museum of Art.
  24. ^ Black Panther, from SIRIS.
  25. ^ Black Panther, from Smithsonian American Art Museum.
  26. ^ Tours War Memorial, from SIRIS.
  27. ^ Model for Tours War Memorial, from SIRIS.
  28. ^ Indian and Eagle, from Brookgreen Collection.
  29. ^ Lyric Love, from SIRIS.
  30. ^ Lyric Love (scroll down for image), from Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University.
  31. ^ Mother and Child, from SIRIS.
  32. ^ "Wild Boars". Smithsonian American Art Museum. Retrieved February 24, 2014.
  33. ^ The Awakening, from SIRIS.
  34. ^ "The Awakening," cover, National Sculpture Review, Spring 1968.
  35. ^ Greyhounds Playing, from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
  36. ^ The Artist's Daughter Gilda, from SIRIS.
  37. ^ Gilda, the Artist's Daughter, from Smithsonian American Art Museum.
  38. ^ Foreign Trade, from SIRIS.
  39. ^ Foreign Trade, from Smithsonian American Art Museum.
  40. ^ Foreign Trade, from SIRIS.
  41. ^ Tiny, from SIRIS.
  42. ^ The American Catholic Who's Who, Volume 7 By Georgina Pell Curtis, Benedict Elder
  43. ^ The Birth of a Nation, from SIRIS.
  44. ^ National Sculpture Review, vol. 5, number 3, fall 1956, p.6.
    Page en the french Wikipedia : Cecil Howard
  45. ^ Rachmaninoff, from SIRIS.
  46. ^ Rachmaninoff, from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
  47. ^ Dawn, from SIRIS.
  48. ^ Bianca II, from SIRIS.
  49. ^ Prometheus Strangling the Vulture, from SIRIS.
  50. ^ Monk at Prayer, from SIRIS.
  51. ^ Anthony Lauck Papers, from University of Notre Dame.
  52. ^ Hound of Heaven, from SIRIS.
  53. ^ Hound of Heaven from TheodoreRoszak.com
  54. ^ Voice in the Wilderness, from SIRIS.
  55. ^ Voice in the Wilderness, from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
  56. ^ Bird, from SIRIS.
  57. ^ Puma, from SIRIS.
  58. ^ Geraldine McCullough, 1917–2008
  59. ^ Seated Woman, from SIRIS.
  60. ^ Seated Woman, from Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
  61. ^ Gateway, from SIRIS.