Madeleine
Park 1891-1960
Born
in Mount Kisco, New York, animal sculptor Madeleine Park was fond
of playing with her many pets as a child. She attended the Emily
Fowler School in Mount Kisco and then went to Blair Academy in
Blairstown, New Jersey, graduating in 1910.
She
enrolled in the Art Students League in New York City, but her
family made her quit because they disapproved of the Life Class
with nude models. In 1913, she married Harold Park, also an artist,
and they had a family which temporarily put her career on hold.
She
took painting from George Barse in Katonah New York, and in 1928
went to Italy with the Barses, which gave her more exposure to
sculpture. In Connecticut, she enrolled in the studio of A. Phimister
Proctor, a renowned animal sculptor who encouraged her to work
from life and not copy others.
Much
of her subject matter came from visiting the circus, the first
effort being an elephant she modeled from one named Cutie of Somer's
Circus. She also got commissions for portraits of domestic pets,
show dogs and horses.
In
the late 1940s, she worked at Hunt's Circus and traveled to India
to purchase wild animals for Charles Hunt, keeping one of the
panthers she obtained for herself. She became a regular exhibitor
at the National Academy of Design and the National Sculpture Society,
and in the 1930s was represented by the Argent Galleries of New
York. She was included in the 1940 Whitney Museum National Sculpture
Society Exhibition and in 1944 had a one-person exhibition at
the J.B. Speed Memorial Museum.
