Rock Creek Cemetery: Part One, Bronzes
Back in November, I met my uncle in Washington DC for a long weekend of historical and operatic delights. He had a car, so he suggested a few things that lay outside of city limits, like Rock Creek Cemetery. I had never heard of Rock Creek before but it was first established in 1719 and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1977.
My uncle had printed out a list of notable sculptures at Rock Creek, of which there are many. We managed to find almost every one on his list, along with a few more along the way. I was surprised at how many large bronzes there were in the relatively small cemetery, including a few men which I don't see nearly as often as the mourning woman.
The Thomas Trueman Gaff monument was sculpted by Jules Dechin and caught our eye immediately. The figure's raised hand and haunting upward gaze is really unnerving. Like most of the sculptures we saw, rain had streaked the face so he looked as if he'd been crying.
At first glance I assumed the Rabboni sculpture was a man, when it's actually a depiction of Mary Magdelene. It was sculpted in 1909 by Gutzon Borglum in tribute to a prominent Washington banker and tapestry collector.
The Kauffmann Memorial is probably my favorite in the cemetery and features a "classically-draped" woman in the process of making a wreath. She is surrounded by bronze panels featuring scenes from Shakespeare's "Seven Ages of Men," from As You Like It. She has such a wonderful, rain-stained face and manages to be incredibly beautiful and haunting-yet-serene all at the same time.
But the most famous of all of the Rock Creek sculptures is undoubtedly the Adams Memorial featuring a seated bronze by Augustus Saint-Gaudens anchoring a plot designed by notorious architect Stanford White. It was erected in 1891 by Henry Adams as a tribute to his wife, who had committed suicide. The plot is encircled by shrubs, keeping the sculpture hidden from view. There is a bench where you can sit, face the figure and contemplate Grief—which has been the title commonly given to the sculpture, apparently much to Henry's chagrin. He wrote to Saint-Gaudens's son, saying:
"Do not allow the world to tag my figure with a name! Every magazine writer wants to label it as some American patent medicine for popular consumption—Grief, Despair, Pear's Soap, or Macy's Mens' Suits Made to Measure. Your father meant it to ask a question, not to give an answer; and the man who answers will be damned to eternity like the men who answered the Sphinx."
