Frances L. Rich Sold at Auction Prices

Rich, The Negress, Bronze

Frances Rich, The Negress, bronze on marble base, signed/inscribed, dated 1937, purchased through Boston Post Rd Gallery, Larchmont NY, 22"h. Frances Irene Rich was born in 1910 in Spokane, Washington. She was an American actress and important sculptor. She was the daughter of famous Hollywood silent screen actress Irene Rich. In 1931, Frances Rich earned a B. A. degree in English literature from Smith College in Massachusetts before dedicating her life to art. She was Lieutenant Director of Nurses in the Navy Reserves from 1942-1944. In 1934, she met Malvina Hoffman in Paris, France, and studied sculpture under her tutelage. Upon returning to America, she did intensive work at the Boston Museum School, Museum of Fine Arts under the tutelage of Alexander Iacovleff, and subsequently established her own studio in Manhattan. Between1937 to 1940, she was enrolled as a resident student at Cranbrook Academy of Art. There she met the famous Swedish sculptor, Carl Milles with whom she worked with for the next 18 years. Her works include portrait busts at Smith College; in 1933, the Spirit of Nursing Monument, which was first dedicated to Army and Navy nurses, is now considered a monument dedicated to all those in the field of nursing, and is located at Arlington National Cemetery, Washington, D.C.; the Laughing Pelican, which appears in front of the Pelican building at the University of California at Berkeley; a marble bust of Alice Stone Blackwell for the Boston Public Library; and portrait busts of activist, Margaret Sanger, opera, singer Lotte Lehman, artist, Diego Rivera, musician, Virgil Thomson, and actress and close friend Katherine Hepburn. In 1970, Frances Rich presented to the American College of Greece her bronze sculpture Mount Hymettus Saint Francis of Assisi. It was donated by Frances Rich to the American College, the only accredited American institution of higher learning in Athens, Greece. Frances Rich has installations in both private and public collections all over the world. In June of 2004, Sotheby's auction house in Manhattan had a sale of her sculptures, including a portrait bust of Katherine Hepburn. The Negress, created and signed by Frances Rich, dated 1937 has a foundry mark by Cellini Bronze Works in NYC. It is numbered, 1. The Negress was delivered in person to Irene Rich, mother of Frances Rich, who had a residence at the Waldorf Astoria in NYC in 1937. Later, Irene Rich presented The Negress (#1) as a gift to Lady Alfred Jacobsen. For several decades The Negress was owned and held as part of the estate of Lady Alfred Jacobsen and remained in her private art collection until it was offered for sale in 2011 at Post Road Gallery, Boston Post Road in Larchmont, New York where the present owner purchased it. In March of 2014, the American College of Greece announced a bequest of 2 million dollars from the estate of Frances Rich, the largest gift in its 137 year history. In 2012, in honor of Frances Rich, the American College of Greece renamed its school of fine and performing arts as the Frances Rich School of Fine and Performing Arts.