Alexander Phimister Proctor
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Alexander Phimister Proctor (September 27, 1860 – September 4, 1950) was an American sculptor with the contemporary reputation of one of the nation's foremost animaliers. Born in Bozanquit, Ontario, his family moved to Denver, Colorado when he was young.
Growing up on the frontier, Proctor early developed into a skilled woodsman and hunter — interests that remained with him for the rest of his life. In his autobiography, Sculptor in Buckskin, he spends as much ink, and seems to be as excited about, bagging his first bear and elk as he is about obtaining his first major commission.
Besides his gun, Proctor took pencils and a sketching pad with him on his trips through the Rocky Mountains. As a hunter he was always careful to measure, draw, and sometimes dissect the animals that had crossed his gun sights. These early studies helped propel him to the position of on of the most sought after and respected aminaliers of his day. He was fortunate to find an art instructor in the still rough and tumble Colorado, where his early drawings included big horn sheep, elk, bears and the lynching of L.H. Musgrove.
In 1885 Proctor sold a homestead that he had acquired in Colorado and used the proceeds to move to New York City with the intention of studying art. He enrolled first in the National Academy of Design where he studied drawing and painting, and later, at the Art Students League where his interest in sculpture came to the fore. His ability to capture animals in action, garnered in part from his days tracking them, coupled with his interest in all things Native American, opened a niche for Proctor, one that he parlayed into a long, successful career.
As with many of his contemporaries, Proctor’s opportunity to work with some of the greatest sculptors of his day, coupled with the opportunity to create his own large, albeit temporary, pieces presented itself in the guise of the World Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago. Several Proctor pieces were paired with Daniel Chester French, then the rising star of the sculpture world. This collaboration resurfaced in the ensuing years when French called upon Proctor to provide mounts for some of his equestrian monuments. Proctor was further called upon to produce works of various Western themes, mostly figures of native animals, but also a cowboy and Indian that were to form the genesis of his later works, The Bucking Bronco and On the War Trail, both found in Denver.
Proctor moved to Paris to continue his studies. During this period he assisted Augustus Saint Gaudens in the creating of the General Logan Monument, now in Chicago. In 1896 he won the Rinehart Scholarship which allowed him to work and study in Paris for four years. By the time he returned to America in 1899 Proctor was well versed in the beaux-arts tradition.
Settling in New York City, Proctor turned out a large number of public monuments in the ensuing decades. In between commissions frequently returned to the West for rejuvenation and inspiration, seeking out members of various Native American tribes to pose for his works.
On a hunting trip to Alaska in 1947 Proctor shot a bear, 70 years to the day that he had bagged his first one.
Proctor died in Palo Alto, California, where he was living with his daughter, just a few days before his 90th birthday.
A sculptor of the "old school," Proctor resisted even the vestiges of modernism that many of his contemporaries adopted. His legacy is scattered from coast to coast across America. As one of the witnesses of the death of the old America (many other artists saw only the birth of the new one) Proctor’s works showing the animals and peoples of frontier America remain popular and as vital today as when he produced them.
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[edit] Selected works
- General John Logan Memorial (horse only), Grant Park, Chicago, Illinois, 1894-97
- William T. Sherman Memorial (horse only), Grand Army Plaza, New York, New York, 1892-1903
- Standing Pumas, Prospect Park, Brooklyn, New York, 1898
- Two Griffins, Saint Louis Art Museum, St. Louis, Missouri, 1904
- Lions for the McKinley Monument, Buffalo, New York, 1907
- Piney Branch Bridge Panthers, Sixteenth Street Bridge, Washington, D.C., 1910
- Tigers, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, 1911
- Buffalo, Q Street Bridge, Washington, D.C., 1914
- Pioneer, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, 1918
- Bucking Bronco, Civic Center, Denver, Colorado, 1920
- Theodore Roosevelt As a Rough Rider, Portland, Oregon, 1922
- On the War Path, Civic Center, Denver, Colorado, 1923
- The Circuit Rider, Salem, Oregon, 1924
- The Pioneer Mother, Kansas City, Missouri, 1925
- Arlington Memorial Bridge Buffalo Heads, Washington, D.C., 1927
- The Western Sheriff [Tillman D. Taylor], Pendleton, Oregon, 1929
- McKnight Memorial Fountain, Wichita, Kansas, 1931
- Pioneer Mother, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, 1932
- Robert E. Lee and Young Soldier, Dallas, Texas, 1935
- Mustangs, Austin, Texas, 1948[1]
[edit] Images
 Bucking Bronco, Denver, Colorado |
 McKnight Memorial, Wichita, Kansas |
 Pioneer Mother, Kansas City, Missouri |
 Tiger, Princeton, New Jersey |
 Pioneer Mother, Eugene, Oregon |
[edit] Notes
- ^ Proctor, Alexander Phimister from the Handbook of Texas Online Gives the name of the sculpture as Mustangs
[edit] Further reading
- Craven, Wayne, Sculpture in America, Thomas Y. Crowell Co, NY, NY 1968
- Hassrick, Peter H, Wildlife and Western Heroes: Alexander Phimister Proctor, Sculptor, Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas 2003
- Proctor, Alexander Phimister, edited by Hester Elizabeth Proctor, Alexander Phimister Proctor, Sculptor in Buckskin: An Autobiography by Alexander Phimister Proctor, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK 1971
- Proske, Beatrice Gilman, Brookgreen Gardens Sculpture, Brookgreen Gardens, South Carolina, 1968
- Taft, Lorado, History of American Sculpture, The MacMillan Company, NY, NY 1925
