The Doyenne of Louisiana Sculpture

The Doyenne of Louisiana Sculpture

The Enduring Significance of Angela Gregory as an artist and an icon

By Elizabeth Chubbuck Weinstein

Angela Gregory in her studio in 1979 with the plaster versions of some of her best-known works: the bust of John McDonough, La Belle Augustine, and Plantation Madonna. Image courtesy of Tulane University Special Collections, Tulane University, New Orleans. Used with permission of the Estate of Angela Gregory.

At a time when women rarely were recognized as professional artists, Angela Gregory (1903–1990) was already making her mark has a sculptor. Just a few years after women received the right to vote in this country, the New York Sun ran the headline: “Prison Walls Made Less Grim by Girl Sculptor, Who at 25 Executes Many Commissions.” That was 1929. Angela went on to receive commissions to make architectural sculpture for many of the most important buildings of her day and three public monuments.

Gregory was born in New Orleans on October 18, the youngest of three children. Her mother Selina Brès was an accomplished artist and Gregory’s first art teacher. A graduate of H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College for Women, Selina was a member of Newcomb’s inaugural pottery decoration class in 1895 and is believed to have sold the first of the now-internationally-recognized Newcomb pots. Gregory’s father William Benjamin Gregory was one of America’s leading hydraulic engineers and a longtime professor in the Tulane University College of Engineering. His contacts helped Angela in obtaining her first architectural commissions.

Gregory exhibited talent as a child and at age fourteen announced her desire to “learn to cut stone.” Her father insisted on a proper education first. She followed her mother’s footsteps and attended Newcomb. There, she was taught by brothers William and Ellsworth Woodward, considered some of the most influential figures in the history of Southern art. Because sculpture was not taught at Newcomb, she augmented her studies elsewhere, taking classes with Albert Rieker at the Arts and Crafts Club in the French Quarter and working a summer in Charles Keck’s New York Studio

It was Ellsworth who introduced Gregory to the work of the French master Antoine Bourdelle (1861-1929) and set her life’s course in motion. Ellsworth told her that if she was determined to become a sculptor, Bourdelle was the one to teach her. Considered France’s greatest living artist at the time, Bourdelle was the former lead assistant to Auguste Rodin (1840-1917). While a Paris education was no longer considered a requirement for professional artists during Gregory’s time, it remained a highly regarded route for artistic study—and with more opportunities for women. To pay her way, Gregory applied for a scholarship in illustrative advertising at what is now Parson’s School of Design—hoping to encounter Bourdelle while she was there. She set sail for France soon after her graduation in 1925.

The story of how Gregory met Bourdelle is the stuff of legends. Near the end of her nine-month term at Parson’s, she wrote to the master sculptor. When he did not respond, she dared to knock on his door and encountered a maid who provided his phone number. Bourdelle’s wife, the sculptor Cléopâtra Sevastos, answered the call. She was sympathetic and arranged an interview. Bourdelle was so impressed with the young American girl who wanted to learn to cut stone that the fifteen-minute appointment stretched into a two-year tutelage. Gregory was the only American and one of few women to study in Bourdelle’s private studio. While there, Gregory completed the stone carving of her first major work, a copy of the Beauvais Head of Christ. Bourdelle was so impressed with her version that he arranged for it to be exhibited alongside his own work at the annual Salon des Tuileries at the end of her studies in 1928.

That first hot summer home, Angela persuaded the teenage daughter of the family housekeeper to pose for her. Gregory later credited La Belle Augustine as her most important work because she said it kicked off her career. Indeed, the architect for the Orleans Parish Criminal Courts commissioned her to design all the sculptures for the new building after seeing the portrait bust, along with other work, at the Gregorys’ home. Her father built her a studio onto the back of the house in the 600 block of Pine Street, complete with a pulley system, where Gregory would live and work for the rest of her life.

Bourdelle taught Gregory the importance of integrating sculpture with architecture, positioning the young artist for greatness right at the end of the international Art Deco design movement. Art Deco buildings were defined by streamlined edifices decorated inside and out with sculptural motifs.

Among the works Gregory designed for the Criminal Courts building were exterior three-dimensional reliefs illustrating New Orleans’s history, as well as two massive pelicans at the corners of the entrance façade.

This early success led to more commissions in New Orleans and around the state. Gregory designed the keystone of Tulane School of Medicine’s Hutchinson Memorial building as the head of Aesculapius in 1930 and designed eight of the twenty-two portrait reliefs on the Louisiana State Capitol in 1931. The exterior reliefs on the St. Landry Parish Courthouse in Opelousas and the Acadiana Center for the Arts, formerly First Nation Bank of Lafayette, are her handiwork. In Baton Rouge, overlooking what was once the lobby of Louisiana National Bank are eight polychrome murals that Gregory carved in 1949. This is now the site of the Watermark Hotel and a restaurant—The Gregory—named in her honor. Gregory’s work also graces buildings on the campuses of Louisiana State University, Tulane University, and Dominican High School, which inherited the sculpture formerly designed for and installed at St. Mary’s Dominican College. And then there is the larger-than-life portrayal of St. Louis, which may be seen through the window overlooking the entrance of the Archdiocesan Administration Building in New Orleans.

In addition to portraits of family members and many friends, including writer and scholar Joseph Campbell, Gregory received commissions for portrayals of significant people for commemorative medals and three monuments.

Public art requires a unique set of considerations, and—as we know—not all of American history’s heroes withstand the test of time. As our country critically reconsiders its own historical narrative, Gregory’s monuments have entered the nationwide conversation about whom we memorialize. Gregory spent five years on the twenty-six-foot-tall three-figure bronze depicting Sieur de Bienville, the founder of New Orleans, who also led campaigns to decimate local Indigenous communities. Her bronze bust of John McDonogh, the philanthropist —and enslaver—credited with founding the New Orleans Public School system, was thrown into the river in June of 2020. Calls to remove her statue of Henry Watkins Allen, the last Confederate governor of Louisiana and Port Allen’s namesake, prompted the West Baton Rouge Museum to delve deeper into the complicated history of the sculpture—and that of the artist. The museum’s director Angelique Bergeron explained that the controversy invited an opportunity to “provide context for this difficult aspect of our parish’s history.”

The result is the museum’s forthcoming three-part exhibition Angela Gregory: Doyenne of Louisiana Sculpture—which will present a comprehensive portrait of the artist’s life and work, which included important advancements for women and minority artists, the creation of some of the South’s most compelling renderings of African Americans, and enduring architectural art adorning some of our region’s most iconic buildings— as well as portrayals of problematic historical figures like Allen.

Part I of the exhibition opens July 15 with an introduction to the artist’s life and art. Two subsequent phases are planned over the next two years that altogether will constitute the most in-depth exploration of Gregory’s work to date. On view will be drawings, plaster maquettes, finished bronzes, models, and even molds selected from private collections and Louisiana museums, many of whom were beneficiaries of the artist’s estate. As a teacher, mentor, and trailblazer, Angela Gregory’s legacy endures as one of Louisiana’s most significant and important artists—the story of a Louisiana woman with courage, determination, and an unparalleled commitment to her art. h

Elizabeth Chubbuck Weinstein is guest curator of the West Baton Rouge Museum’s exhibition Angela Gregory: Doyenne of Louisiana Sculpture, which will be open from July 15–August 6.