Text: Edgar Allan Poe (?), Literary, Broadway Journal (New York), October 11, 1845, vol. 2, no. 14, p. ???, col. ?

[page 214, column 1, continued:]

To all lovers of the true and beautiful in art we recommend a visit to the Ivory Christ, brought from Italy by C. Edwards Lester, our Consul at Genoa, and now being exhibited in Broadway opposite the Park. This figure (it cannot properly be called a statue) is the work of an Italian Monk, an educated man, but with little knowledge of art. A deep enthusiasm — an overwhelming passion to do justice to the intellectual and physical character of the God-man, seems to have been in this case at once the instigation and the instruction. The material is the tusk of an antique elephant — a tusk of enormous size. Much of it had to be cut away on account of its carious condition, and yet the figure is 32 inches long, (we believe) and 8 inches broad through the shoulders: — all this solid — the arms are wrought from separate pieces.

The first point noticeable in this Christ is the intellectuality of its expression. All other representations of the Saviour make him merely benevolent, dignified, meek, self-sustained, and beautiful in feature. In this, mind — genius — predominates. The whole face is eminently intellectual.

The second thing to be observed is the absolute truth of the entire design. The figure depends from the cross precisely as the human form would depend under the circumstances. The moment chosen is that immediately succeeding death. We are made to fancy that the last sigh has just issued from his lips — on which is now fading a divine smile. We can see, nevertheless, that the death has been agonizing. The contraction of the muscles, more particularly about the calves, toes and lumbar regions, are absolute in the truth of their expression. In anatomy the whole figure is perfect. We doubt if a better model of the human frame is to be found anywhere. The work altogether is of a very high order of genius.

In our next we shall endeavor to do justice to the inimitable Sortie du Bain — De Kuyper's — now to be seen at the Society Library. We have no patience with those who decry it.

P.