The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-08-24
THEO KITsoN, SCULPTOR.
Talented and, Though Boston
Woman, Beautiful"
Boston Globe.

Boston Globe.
When grizzled veterans of the civil war
crowded around Theo Alice Ruggles Kit
son at Newburyport, July 4. and with
tears in their eyes told her that her statue
of the volunteer of 81 was the most per-
feet representation of the typical soldier
of the army TO which they once belonged,
they probably paid her the greatest tribute
ever received by woman sculptor.
Owing 20 the fact that Mrs. Kitsons hus-
band is a famous sculptor, and TO the mis-
take so frequently made, in taking it for
granted that her first name, Theo, is an
abbreviation of Theodore, many casual
readers of the newspapers have the impress
sion that the beautiful sculptured memo
rial TO NewburypOrts dead in the civil
war, unveiled a few days ago. was exc
cuted by Mr.. Kitson.
The fact is, however, that it is the work
of beautiful young woman, not yet turned
thirty, who for a dozen years has been re-
garded as one Of the worlds foremost
women sculptors, and who now has
achieved the distinction of being the first OF
her sex to execute a soldiers monument.
Mrs. kitson's Volunteer is the ripe frui-
ton of a genius that found its first notable
expression when she was fourteen in a
snow. in the front yard of her fathers
house in BrOOkline.
Edward c.. Cabot, a Boston architect,
now a member of the art commission, saw
the snow horse, and was so impressed by
its artistic excellence that he urged the
cultivation of her genius
Her application for admission to the
School OF Sculpture at the Boston Art Mu-
scum having Deen rejected, on account of
her youth, she became pupil of Henry II.
Kitson. whom she married eight years
later.
AT the age of sixteen she went to Paris
and studied and worked there for three
years. When seventeen she exhibited at the
| Paris salon, her exhibit having been cat
| alOgued, h. u mistake that has since fire.
quenuy occurred, as the work of Mr.. Theo-
! dore Ruggles.
She was awarded a medal the first ever
won by a woman for sculpture at the salon.
| and great was the sensation when the sex
! of the sculptor was disclosed and ii was
| learned that she was scarcely more than a
| child.
The prize winner was a composition call
| ed The Young Orpheus" being boy. life
size. sitting on 4 tree stump. playing pipe,
| 10 the air of which rabbits were dancing.
| Another creation of a somewhat kindred
| character also received 81 prize at the next
salon.
| Miss RuggIes returned to Boston, and in
| 1898 became the wife Of her teacher. Her
| marriage resulted in no material diminution
| of her study and her artistic work, and
/ since then. rs when student. she has eX-
ecuted her work I'm tho studio of her hus-
| band which is now in the Pope building on
Columbus avenue.
Mrs Kitson can hardly be said TO have
| a special line in sculpture. for her work
/ appears TO be Of a uniform excellence,
whether expressive of the purely ideal or
| of the practical In fact. tx is her happy
/ blending OF the ideal and the practical in
| portrait sculpture that furnishes her chief
/ claim TO pre-eminence.
She has a rare faculty OF infusing life
| into her work-the rarest of all gifts found
! in the artist. And this propensity at once
led her. in designing her soldier for the
| Newburyport memorial, to completely ig-
more the conventional type of the private
| represented on soldiers monuments
| throughout the country, nearly always seen
standing at parade rest. ready TO shoot