The Angel of the Waters on top of the Bethesda Fountain in Central Park is one of the icons of New York and one of the most photographed monuments of the city. It also appears in so many movies, but almost nobody knows the artist who created it, Emma Stebbins.
Luckily, the first ever biography of Emma Stebbins “Emma and the Angel of Central Park – The Story of a New York Icon and the Woman who created it” by Maria Teresa Cometto is now also published in English by Bordighera Press (last year was published in Italian by Neri Pozza).
The English edition was launched at the Italian Cultural Institute of New York on May 31st, which was the 150th anniversary of the inauguration of the Bethesda Fountain.
It was a full house, with more than one hundred people attending listening to the author Cometto and the other speakers: John Steele Gordon, writer and descendant of Emma Stebbins; Matt Reiley, Associate Director of Conservation for the Central Park Conservancy; Julia Markus, author of “Across An Untried Sea: Discovering Women’s Lives Hidden in The Shadow of Convention and Time” and Lisa Ackerman, Visiting Assistant Professor, Pratt Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment.
The evening started with the welcome remarks of Professor Fabio Finotti, the Director of the Institute: he observed that angels are a very fascinating subject that is common to Jews, Christians and Muslims, and he’s thinking of a new conference about it. The Italian Consul General Fabrizio di Michele stressed how Cometto’s book is interesting also because it tells a story that links Italy to America, Rome to New York.
The moderator of the evening was Professor Anthony Tamburri, Dean of John D. Calandra Institute (Queens College CUNY) and also co-founder of Bordighera Press. Gordon talked about the history of the Stebbins family in New York. Reiley explained how important is the Angel of the Waters for Central Park and said that Cometto’s book “makes flesh of the pioneering sculptor Emma Stebbins. In Emma and the Angel of Central Park, the Bethesda Angel is symbolically affirmed as a NYC talisman and subtly recast by her ‘troubling of the waters’ of current earthly affairs.
Markus talked about the actress Charlotte Cushman, the “wife” of Emma and about all the other American women artists living in Rome in the second half of the nineteen century. Ackerman, who is also the Executive Director at Columbus Citizens Foundation, recalled: “Emma Stebbins is to most a forgotten figure of the 19th century, yet her creation, Angel of the Waters, at Bethesda Fountain in Central Park is one of the most iconic images in New York City.
Cometto’s book provides great insight into Emma’s life and makes clear that she was a vibrant, engaged, and knowledgeable artist. Her travels to Italy offer some insight into her influences as well as her aspirations. We may never know what inspired her to create an Angel for Central Park, but thanks to Maria Teresa Cometto, we now know that Emma Stebbins was a groundbreaking figure who deserves celebration equal to her Angel.”
Cometto noticed that the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Emma’s Angels was a great kick-off to the Gay Pride Month. “The gay community has been the first one to remember and celebrate Emma,” she said, showing the cover of “A Guide to Lesbian & Gay New York Historical Landmarks” that was published 25 years ago by Andrew S. Dolkart, a New York City architectural historian and co-founder of NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project where the Angel of the Waters is featured. That’s why in the audience there were Sue Doster, co-chair of NYC PRIDE and J. Soto, Director of Engagement and Inclusion of the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art.
At the end of the event, there was a toast to Emma and the Angel, courtesy of “”The First Vermouth – Carpano 1786”.
