Don Quixote is on horseback. At the lower right is a group of cougars who still live in the wild in the Great Pyrenees mountains on the French/Spanish border. Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (b.1564 Alcala, Spain – d. Madrid, Spain 1616) wrote 'Don Quixote' to mock the then-popular novels of chivalry, which glorified the ideals of courtesy, constancy, bravery and loyalty. Their heroine was usually a young unmarried woman. The stereotypical plots were unreal and extravagant, made up of the hero's battles with other knights, beasts, giants and magicians. The hero always won the battles and claimed the love of the maiden on whose behalf he was fighting. Don Quixote is also a biography of a wandering rogue (picaro) who undertakes a series of adventures. Cervantes is considered to be one of the greatest figures of both Spanish and world literature. His father was an unsuccessful physician who moved frequently. Cervantes had little formal education. As a youth he found employment in a cardinal's home in Rome. Later he became a soldier. He distinguished himself in the epic and historic Battle of Lepanto, where he was wounded and his left hand was permanently crippled. After a lengthy recovery and more military duty, he left Italy for Spain in 1575. Cervantes was captured on his return journey by Barbary pirates. He was taken to Algiers and imprisoned for five years. Trinitarian friars paid his ransom. Free Cervantes began writing his first verses. Numerous references to the themes of freedom and captivity would appeare in his work. Back in Madrid, Cervantes married and worked at various jobs including that of tax collector, where he collected grain and oil for the Spanish Armada. He frequently got into trouble over illegal seizures of property and other unauthorized acts. On occasion he landed in jail. He used his jail time to develop Don Quixote, which he began in 1602. Samuel Taylor Coleridge said that Don Quixote 'personified the two elements of human nature: Soul and sense, poetry and prose.' Cervantes' characters are carefully drawn. They include the knight-errant, Don Quixote, his assistant, Sancho Panza, Rozinante, the horse, and Dulcinea, the lady. From the novel, the word 'quixotic' has come into the English language. 'Don Quixote' carries a universal message. It has been translated into nearly every language. Anna Hyatt Huntington made the sculpture.
Anna Hyatt Huntington
(b. 1876 Cambridge, MA – d. Redding, CT 1973)
became one of the best-known and most prolific sculptors of the 20th century. Her father, a paleontologist, interested her in animals. She began to make sculptures of animals that she observed on farms and at the New York City Zoo. She trained as a sculptor, first in Boston, then at the Art Students League in New York, and was taught by Hermon Atkins MacNeil and George Barnard. She also worked for the sculptor Gutzon Borglum.In the early 1900s, she shared an apartment with the figure sculptor Abastenia St. Leger Eberle. They collaborated on sculptures; Anna Hyatt made the animal figures and Abastenia the human figures. She also studied and worked in France and Italy. One of her earliest public works was the equestrian statue of Joan of Arc, exhibited at the Salon of 1910 in Paris. Several replicas were made, and the statue won Anna the Legion of Honor from the French government. One version is in Rivrside Park in NYC. In 1927, she made her first sculpture of 'El Cid Campeador' for the city of Seville, Spain. In 1923, she married the wealthy philanthropist/poet/Spanish scholar Archer M. Huntington (Archer was the adopted son of Collis P. Huntington, the railroad magnate). The couple later (1929) bought 10,000 acres of land near the Atlantic Ocean in South Carolina, named it Brookgreen Gardens and made it a showplace for Anna's work and for the work of dozens of American figurative sculptors. It was also a sanctuary for plant and animal life of the region. The couple gave the estate, with an endowment, to the state of South Carolina in 1935. It is still a major tourist attraction. She has a sculpture in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. Huntington's work is in many American public collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Cleveland Museum of Art, Dallas Museum of Art, Legion of Honor in San Francisco, Edinburgh Museum, and Brookgreen Gardens. An equestrian 'El Cid' bronze sculpture group stands on Audubon Terrace, outside the Hispanic Society of America (founded by her husband). She has a sculpture of Joan of Arc in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and an equestrian sculpture of Joan of Arc in Riverside Park, both in NYC. Anna and Archer eventually settled in Connecticut in 1940. Their estate Stanerigg Farm, was full of animals, birds, and visited by their many friends. Anna continued to sculpt until her death at age 97.
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1) Map of Audubon Terrace [28]
