Author: meredith bergmann

Lucy J. Brown

Ithaca, NY
2024
bronze
51” x 60” x 39”
Commissioned by Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services

An outspoken fighter for social justice and co-found of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services, Lucy Brown was born in Ithaca in 1933. Here, Kate De La Garza, the current Executive Director of INHS, enjoys Miss Lucy’s energy.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Site & Design Drawing


The “Million-Dollar Staircase”, New York State Capitol, Albany, NY before installation of RBG portrait.

Design drawing for RBG portrait to be carved in sandstone from the original quarry in Scotland. Justice Ginsburg is wearing her massive Dissent Collar instead of the wreaths worn by Clara Barton, Susan B. Anthony, etc. in their 19th c. portraits carved at the bottom of the staircase.

Lexington Women’s Monument (detail: Caroline Wellington)


2024
bronze

Caroline Wellington was a champion of women’s suffrage for more than 60 years. In 1887 she and her sisters made a banner for the Boston Suffrage Bazaar that quoted Abigail Harrington’s famous call to wake her son to join the battle of Lexington on April 19, 1775. In 1912, 92-year-old Caroline passed the banner to younger suffragists to carry in their march on Washington, D.C. Here, she is dressed as if for that march.

“Something Is Being Done:” The Lexington Women’s Monument

Lexington, MA
2024
bronze
12’ x 16’ x 4”
granite plaza 28’ diameter

Commissioned by LexSeeHer, Inc.
Donated to the Town of Lexington, MA

Celebrating the contributions made by bold Lexington women from the 18th century to the 21st, who when faced with injustice or seemingly insurmountable obstacles determined that “Something Must Be Done.” 

FDR Hope Memorial (detail)

2021
bronze and granite
figures 1.15 times life size

FDR’s body is sculpted to accurately depict his paralysis from polio, and seated in a wheelchair of his own design. In a joyful moment, he greets a similarly disabled young girl who represents the many children treated at Warm Springs, the facility FDR founded, where he returned often for treatment, refreshment and hope.

FDR Hope Memorial

2021
bronze and granite,
oval pavement 36’ x 29′
figures 1.15 times life size

The first memorial to focus both on FDR’s disability and his heroism.  The transformation of Roosevelt Island from a place of quarantine, penal servitude and hopelessness to a center for treatment and research in polio and then to one of the first communities to “mainstream” disabled patients is chronicled in an inscribed timeline. The statues stand on a white granite oval the size of the Oval Office, and the paths and benches are designed to accommodate a range of abilities.

The Expulsion

31” x 32” x 2”
2016
bronze, gold leaf

This is part of a series of Renaissance-style bas-reliefs depicting Biblical characters in appropriate attitudes and situations that mimic the design of contemporary traffic signs. My intention is the opposite of Jasper Johns’ when he painted flags and maps; I want to take an image that has been stripped of narrative, character and any human particulars– a sign– and make it back into a symbol. Here, the Children Crossing carrying their schoolbooks become a gutsy Eve leading an abashed Adam.

Daphne Reconsidering

1988
100” x 84” x 60”

Daphne, many centuries after turning into a tree to escape Apollo’s amorous advances, begins to turn back into a woman. I love the insistence with which the shapes of human anatomy leap out from the natural world. I had been concerned with the absence of the human figure in contemporary sculpture, and related this to the Greek myth, to the possibility of Daphne regretting her ancient transformation and beginning to desire human form again.

photo by Michael Bergmann

Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument

Literary Walk, Central Park, New York City
Bronze and granite
14′ x 12′ x 6′
figures 1.65 times life size

Portraying:
Sojourner Truth
Susan B. Anthony
Elizabeth Cady Stanton


Commissioned by Monumental Women
Donated to New York City
Unveiled on August 26, 2020