Genius of Mirth
Thomas Crawford
1842; carved 1843 · Marble · The American Wing
During a visit to Crawford’s Rome studio in 1842, the New Yorker Henry Hicks gave him an order for a sculpture, leaving the theme to the artist’s choosing. Crawford’s selection of a lighthearted youth was likely to please his patron, as images of children at play were especially popular in the mid-nineteenth century. He described his subject as "a boy of seven or eight years, dancing in great glee, and tinkling a pair of cymbals." The sculptor and his contemporaries relished the technical challenges of carving marble; the raised left leg epitomizes the virtuosity they delighted in displaying.
- Artist
- Thomas Crawford
- Date
- 1842; carved 1843
- Medium
- Marble
- Culture
- American
- Department
- The American Wing
- Credit line
- Bequest of Annette W. W. Hicks-Lord, 1896
