The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-11-17
A FIGURE.
A Detroit Sculptor's Idea of a Fair Woman
Divine1y Formed.

Detroit Free Press.
"Defne a good fgure77 said Mrs. kellogg, the
well-known Detroit sculptor. well, a good fig
ure is a rarity. There are so many girls who
come to me to pose as models, and so very few
who are of the least use. Their knees are
crooked, and their arms bent, and their waists
pinched in-there is always something wrong.
See that head and trunk That is Proserpine.
She is shrinking away from Pluto, who is about
to carry her away to the internal regions to be
his wife. Now, do you know that it took sittings
of five different models to make that one piecel
Now, you can imagine how hard it
is to find a really good figure. l
did see a good figure once. She was almost
perfect. You know that Venus de Medici is
supposed to be the perfection Of form. Well,
this girls figure was almost identical with hers,
Had l wished tomake a full-sized statue, would
not have changed her one iota. She was a
wealthy girl, and very indolent. Sitting always
in her rooms in negiigee costume, and taking so
little exercise, she grew to be the very perfec-
ton of grace. Every pose was a study, and
every move beautiful. And do you know that
girl laced-terribly sol She compressed her
waist. / should think, seven inches smaller than
it naturally was. But then she wore corsets for
only about three hours each week, she went out
SO little. She was a very attractive girl, but
not very pretty-very good figures seldom are.
l will give you her dimensions. She was five
feet four and a half inches high. Then she meas
ured thirty-one inches about the bust, twenty
six and d half inches about the waist, thirty-hve
inches over the hips, nine inches from the arm
pit to the waist, eleven and a half inches around
the ball of the arm, nine and a fourth inches
around the elbow, and six and a half
inches around the wrist. You see
she tapered four and a half inches
from the bust to the waist; that is right. Small
waists and large hips look horrible to an artist.
Then her hands and feet were good and large.
An artist always looks for large e~xtremities.
The feet of this girl were 81 inches long. What
an immense hoof, do you say. Well, not so
very large. l think it was a No. 4 shoe she took.
Now, here is a cut of a root not so large, you
will say. Well, it measures 81 inches. The
fingers Of the hand. too, must be long and taper,
with a curve backward at the tips. Women
have come to me SO proud of their hands, such
tiny hands, and yet perfect deformities, with
every finger warped and crooked
II should have said, of course, that no figure
can be good unless well rounded and free from
angles, l must confess, though, that a fine,
statuesaue figure would not look well draped in
the present fashion. Yes, l will give my idea
of a fine figure in the present fashion. Bust
measure, SO inches; waist, "a; 9 inches from
armpit to waist; long arms and long neck. By
neck l mean from the Collar bone to the chin;
and recollect this, l would rather see the waist
% inches than %. This figure shall be 3 feet II
in height l once saw a figure | admired a good
dea: that was "a about the bust and % about the
waist"