Assisi: An Online Journal of Arts & Letters Volume 4, Issues 1 & 2 | Page 32
of Kew Gardens, by welcoming Civic Virtue into their midst were attempting to impart
the virtues of temperance, prudence, courage and justice to newer and darker hued
immigrants pouring into Flushing, Corona and Jamaica in other, later waves of
immigration. These immigrants’ disapproval may have motivated the removal of the
statue to Green-Wood Cemetery on
December 15th, 2012. Perhaps the only
community that can bear the presence
of Civic Virtue in its midst are those
permanently at repose.
Serra, of Spanish and Jewish
ancestry, was born in San Francisco at
eve of the Second World War.
MacMonnies, a Scot, was born in
Brooklyn Heights during the Civil War.
MacMonnies was a member of the
Beaux-arts movement that was
dedicated to neoclassical revival in arts
and architecture during the late 1800’s
How a r d S k r i ll , Fou n ta i n t ha t on ce h el d C i vi c Vi r tu e
T r iu mph a n t o ver Un r i ght eou sn es s, Un i on Tu r np ik e ,
Q uee n s, O i l Pa s t el, O i l S t i ck , P en ci l , Ch a lk Pa st el on
Pa p er , 14 ” x 1 7 ”. ©2 0 15
and early 1900’s. Serra was a PostWorld War II Minimalist. Minimalism
celebrated the processes and materials
of post war industrial production by the creation and display of artworks using the
materials and possessing the appearance and function of industrial objects. Minimalists
often embraced steel and iron as materials of choice for sculptur K\