Show EXIT WOMEN ANGELS CONTROVERSY OVER FIGURES IN NEW YORK CHURCH ENDS Sculptor Qorglum Transforms Statues in the Cathedral of St John the Divine So They Are Neither Man Nor Woman Sculptor Gtitrou Horglum who furnished the angel figures for the cathedral of SL John the Divine at Now York city has at last lost out In his contention with tho committee that tho feminine typo Is tho correct one notwithstanding tho fact that he showed precedents In tho angels of Iergulne of Fra Angelica and of our own American French many of which are evidently women His reverend and learned critics cared nothing for precedent all angola wore male tho Bible always referred to tin angel as ho tho very word angel was masculine mas-culine In all languages In which there arc distinctions of gender All the world took up the discussion and many comments greeted the stern attitude of the reverend and learned critics But those gentlemen had tho final word Mr Borglum had to make his angels over to suit them That Is why tho rounded busts ot the statues have bean hacked off that Is why tho waving locks have been cit down that Is why tho soft contours con-tours of the faces have been made more angular The controversy was absurd Mr Borglum declared It was so absolutely abso-lutely ridiculous that I can hardly find an excuse for speaking of it at all When I made those angels I did apiece a-piece of work which involved as much study as much serious heartfelt contemplation con-templation and consideration as the modeling of n Virgin or other sacred figure I endeavored to draw an angel not a man nor a woman but an angel In modeling theso figures I made what to mo expressed the highest high-est best and most sacred of all Ideals tIt was to Impart to those faces and forms as nearly as possible a semblance sem-blance to something divine something that when wo look at It wo feel Hero Is the figure of an angel here Is a representation rep-resentation in human form of a perfect per-fect being which has been carried In the Imagination of man since his brain was capable of comprehension It was to mo tho production of an Ideal I had cherished In childhood It was tho result of matured idealiza uon To say I was shocked when form figure and contour of face were obJected ob-jected to on the ground that they were too feminine because there wero lnO women angels and that these must be made to look like mon Is but mildly mild-ly expressing my state of mind Up to that moment had you asked me I 00 whether my angels wore men or women I could not have told you and the material able of tho question brought ho abruptly to my attention was a shock What did I do about tho new models mod-els Well In tho beginning I absolutely abso-lutely swept aside nil question of my making the figures men I could not consider the question of BOX In the production of such woik Making tho now design I went to work on a different dif-ferent basis and 11 took me a longtime long-time to get what I wanted After n good deal of thought on i the subject I matin tho now design t 1 V l ir jt II IIPIM YV GUTZQM gQP The position of the angels is not materially mate-rially changed but the lines of contour con-tour are Tho hulr and expression are different but there Is no question of sex in them They are angels and I could not make them more mon Aside from the artistic Impossibility Impossibil-ity of making a brawny muscular figure for such a purpose It would to my mind bo sacrilegious As the angels now stand recut they are to me neither men nor women they are but angels I dont know what they may be to others Tho figures are changed of course but they are by no means the figures of men In recutting them I kept my mind on tho Idea that they must bo strong powerful angels not gentle sympathetic heavenly figures Perhaps Per-haps It is the power that I wished to Impart In the recutting and new designing that marks them and stamps them with a more masculine form |