Philomela
John Gregory American, born England
In the Greek myth, the gods transformed Philomela into a swallow and her sister Procne into a nightingale. Gregory, however, conformed to later interpretations of the myth and depicted the partially draped Philomela becoming a nightingale, growing highly decorative wings. The crouching figure, posed with remarkable torsion, is rhythmic and stylized, recalling the archaic Greek works admired by Gregory, Paul Manship, and other early-twentieth-century sculptors. The symmetry and frontality of this sculpture may be explained by the installation of the original lifesize Philomela against a garden wall at the estate of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, in Westbury, Long Island.
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