The Creation Sculptures
National Cathedral, Washington, D.C.
Frederick Hart was born in Atlanta in 1943. Hart attended the University of South Carolina, the Corcoran School of Art and American University from 1960 through 1966. In 1974, he won an international competition to design the west facade of the National Cathedral. In 1979, he created the processional cross for Pope John Paul II that was used for the historic mass on the mall in Washington, D.C. In November of 1984, Hart's historic "Three Soldiers" is installed at the site of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. and dedicated by President Ronald Reagan.
We sometimes forget that great men, great artists, caught as they are in the glare of history's spotlight, are not great from birth, are not hatched into quick fame, but reach completeness slowly, deliberately, under the watchful tutelage of time. Rodin, for example, that colossus of nineteenth century sculpture, did not achieve immediate recognition. More than a few parallels have been drawn between Auguste Rodin and the young American sculptor Frederick Hart.
Time magazine wrote... "The three U.S. soldiers, cast in bronze, stand a bit larger than life, carry automatic weapons and wear fatigues, but the pose is not John Wayne-heroic: the American boys are spectral and wary, even slightly bewildered. J. Carter Brown, Chairman of the Fine Arts Committee and Director of the National Gallery, called it 'a credit to Hart....the three soldiers act as kind of a Greek chorus facing the monument, commenting on its meaning.'"
Frederick Hart's works will live on as a benchmark to future sculptors. His legacy will be penned in history books as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century.
Three Soldiers
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Washington, D.C.
