Diana

Diana balances on the front of one foot, with the other leg stretched behind her. Her arrow runs almost level with her face. Follow that straight line toward the long curve of the bow, then down to the small rounded support beneath her foot. The outstretched arm, lifted leg and curved bow make a clear silhouette. The sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens designed Diana in 1892–93 for the tower of Stanford White’s Madison Square Garden in New York. A first figure had proved too large. The smaller replacement became a landmark on the city skyline before the building was demolished. At the scale of the museum cast, you can also follow the turn of her head and the slight shift of her torso above that single supporting foot. The Met’s gilded bronze was cast in 1928 at half the size of the second tower figure. A mold associated with a cement cast once owned by White supplied its form.