Meg Merrilies
Edward R. Thaxter
(American, 1857–1881)
about 1881
Object PlaceFlorence, Italy
Medium/TechniqueMarble
DimensionsOverall: 66.68 x 46.99 x 38.74 cm (26 1/4 x 18 1/2 x 15 1/4 in.)
Mount (1/2" S.S. steel rod / dry mounted onto steel plate Nagoya): 1.4 x 30.5 x 25.4 cm (9/16 x 12 x 10 in.)
Mount (1/2" S.S. steel rod / dry mounted onto steel plate Nagoya): 1.4 x 30.5 x 25.4 cm (9/16 x 12 x 10 in.)
Credit LineWilliam E. Nickerson Fund
Accession number63.5
On View
On viewClassificationsSculpture
Collections
Meg Merrilies is the ugly, half-mad gypsy in Sir Walter Scott's novel "Guy Mannering" (1815). Like West's "King Lear," exhibited nearby, the sculpture speaks to the wild and fearsome aspects of life-the exact opposite of the calm, classicism often represented in art. Thaxter, originally from Maine, worked in Florence. He drew upon a variety of visual sources, from Hellenistic Roman images of haggard market women to the dramatic marbles of the great Baroque sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini.
Provenance1963, The Crown Studio, through John Cunningham, New York (accesseion date January 9, 1963).
