In 1894, Shrady graduated from Columbia University, where he was a member of the Varsity Show, and then spent one year at Columbia's law school.[2] He left law school to join with his brother-in-law, Jay Gould (son of the financier Edwin Gould), at the Continental Match Company. The company failed, and Shrady contracted typhoid fever, which diverted him forever from the business world. His recuperation left spare time to pursue a growing interest in art.
Shrady's wife, Harrie Moore, submitted some of his paintings to an exhibition of the National Academy of Design without his knowledge, and they sold quickly. He then began to teach himself sculpture using zoo animals and his pets as models.[1]
He modeled a series of popular bronze statuettes, mostly of animals. His first major commission came in 1901, for George Washington at Valley Forge, an equestrian statue for Continental Army Plaza in Brooklyn, New York.
Shrady and architect Edward Pearce Casey won the competition to build the Ulysses S. Grant Memorial in 1902. In the twenty years Shrady spent executing its sculpture program, he studied biology at the American Museum of Natural History and dissected horses to gain a better understanding of animal anatomy.[1] The memorial was dedicated on April 27, 1922, two weeks after Shrady's death.
The Grant Memorial is described as "one of the most important sculptures in Washington" by James M. Goode in The Outdoor Sculpture of Washington, D.C. It consists of a colossal equestrian statue of Grant atop a marble pedestal with bas relief plaques, guarded by four lions. Large sculpture groups of the Cavalry and Artillery flank this to the north and south, with a reflecting pool to the west.[3]
Legacy
Shrady in his studio with sons Frederick and Lewis, circa 1911. His model for General Alpheus S. Williams is in the background.
A collaborative bronze statue by Shrady and Lentelli was destroyed by the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, which melted the statue in 2023.[6]
Cavalry Charge (1902–1916, cast 1924), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.[14] This is a miniature version of the sculpture group from the Grant Memorial.[15]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Henry Shrady.
Bibliography
Montagna, Dennis R., Henry Merwin Shrady's Ulysses S. Grant Memorial in Washington, D.C.: A Study in Iconography, Content and Patronage, Doctoral dissertation, University of Delaware, 1987
Nawrocki, Dennis Alan and Thomas J. Holleman, Art in Detroit Public Places, Wayne State University Press, Detroit, Michigan, 1980
Opitz, Glenn B, Editor, Mantle Fielding’s Dictionary of American Painters, Sculptors & Engravers, Apollo Book, Poughkeepsie NY, 1986
Taft, Lorado, The History of American Sculpture, MacMillan Co., New York, NY, 1925
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