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Curator Pick of the MonthLabel
What better way to celebrate the Fourth of July than with the Modèle du Comité, a model of the Statute of Liberty. The model is made by the same sculptor as the actual statue, Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi. It is possible that A. J. Drexel met Bartholdi because they were both members of the Franco-American alliance, a group dedicated to raise funds to build the pedestal for the statue in New York. In order to raise funds for the project, models like this were sold. This model is numbered “50,” and is one of only four that remain today. The sculpture was displayed in the Christie’s exhibition “Images of Liberty: Models and Reproductions of the Statue of Liberty 1867 – 1917” in 1986, and now has a prominent home in the Main Building’s Great Court.