Artist/Maker
Barbara Chase-Riboud
(b. 1939)
Depicted
Sojourner Truth
(1797 – 1883)
Maquette (Sojourner Truth Monument)
1999
Bronze
Overall: 20 x 24 x 14 in. (50.8 x 61 x 35.6 cm)
Purchase
2007.13
Sojourner Truth (ca. 1797–1883) escaped slavery in 1826 to become a prominent African American abolitionist and women’s rights activist. Chase-Riboud inserts Truth into an equestrian monument tradition usually reserved for white male statesmen. Rather than depict her riding the horse, however, the artist shows her leading it while holding a lantern aloft. Truth appears less to command than to seek, even as she brings light into a dark world. The artist submitted this maquette to a memorial statue competition in Truth’s hometown of Florence in Northampton, Massachusetts.
DescriptionBronze maquette for never-realized equestrian monument to Sojourner Truth.ClassificationsSCULPTURE
Collections
- Sculpture Highlights
- Underground Railroad
