Washington's Warning
Document Type
Essay
Publication Title
First Things - Web Exclusives
Publication Date
8-23-2018
Abstract
(Excerpt)
My friend John McGinnis has written a thoughtful review of “Canova’s George Washington,” a current exhibit at the Frick Collection in New York. The exhibit tells the story of a famous nineteenth-century sculpture of George Washington, now lost, by the Italian neo-classicist Antonio Canova. Although a fire destroyed the work (once housed in the North Carolina State Capitol) shortly after its completion, Canova’s full-sized plaster model remains. That model, dramatically displayed in a rotunda-like gallery, is the highlight of the exhibit.
Canova imagined Washington as a Roman general, clad in ancient armor and with his weapons at his feet, drafting his famous “Farewell Address to the People of the United States.” By presenting Washington as a classical rather than a contemporary figure, McGinnis writes, the statue emphasizes America’s role as a model for all nations and eras. The statue demonstrates “the universality of the ideas of America’s founding revolution”—the capacity of those ideas to “light up the rest of the world.”
Comments
Originally published at: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2018/08/washingtons-warning