Sunday, June 26, 2011

The "Lion Fighter" Prevails


The original Lion Fighter sits as a companion piece to Auguste Kiss's Mounted Amazon Attacked by a Panther on the steps of the National Museum in Berlin. The Fairmount Park Art Association purchased the original plaster cast for The Lion Fighter in 1889 and placed it in Memorial Hall for public viewing, along with a plaster version of the Amazon. This bronze was cast locally by the Bureau Brothers in 1892 for exhibition at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. When returned to Philadelphia, it was installed on a "jutting rock" on East River Drive. It was moved to the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1929, where—as in Berlin—it accompanies a bronze cast of the Amazon.

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