Please join us in welcoming Dr. Sarah Greenough for a talk on Augustus Saint-Gaudens’s Shaw Memorial to mark Black History Month. The Memorial, which was dedicated in 1897 and stands on Boston Common, honors the soldiers of the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment of the Civil War, one of the first African American regiments in the US Army. Dr. Greenough, the Senior Curator and Head of the Department of Photographs at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. will discuss the significance of this memorial both at the time of its creation and today, exploring its shifting legacy. She will also examine how Irish artist Augustus Saint-Gaudens came to create this piece, working with various Black models to represent the individual soldiers and create this highly unusual bas-relief monument.
