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Lot Essay
Joseph Mozier (1812-1876) was born in Burlington, Vermont and in 1831 moved to New York City where he became a very successful dry-goods merchant. In 1845 he moved to Europe to pursue an artistic career, studying firstly in Florence and then working in Rome amongst the international school of neoclassical sculptors which flourished in that city during the mid-19th century. His determination led to success and with the aid of a profile in the Art Journal in 1859 he won considerable acclaim at the 1862 International Exhibition in London with an example of the present lot and his marble of Pocahontas.
No doubt facilitated by his personal fortune, Mozier was in the rare position of not being necessitated to model portrait commissions for patrons, but was instead free to devote himself to ideal pieces based on literary, scriptural, or historical themes. Modeled in Rome around 1857, The Wept of Wish-ton-wish is based on James Fenimore Cooper's 1829 novel of the same name. The subject is the novel's Puritan heroine, Ruth Heathcote, who was abducted as a child by the Narragansett Indians. She was raised by the tribe and grew-up safely in their culture, marrying a Narragansett brave named Conanchet and taking the tribal name Narra-matta. The story, however, ends tragically when Ruth's husband is captured and executed whilst saving Ruth's real parents from a rival tribe. After, she is re-united with her family and reverts to Christianity, only to die of a broken heart. Mozier depicts the confusing and ambivalent nature of the heroine's situation at the moment she recognizes her own mother's voice.
At least two other versions are recorded, one dated 1866 in the James H. Ricau Collection, Chrysler Museum of Art, and another, dated 1865, sold Christie's, New York, 4 December 1996, lot 63 ($32,200).
No doubt facilitated by his personal fortune, Mozier was in the rare position of not being necessitated to model portrait commissions for patrons, but was instead free to devote himself to ideal pieces based on literary, scriptural, or historical themes. Modeled in Rome around 1857, The Wept of Wish-ton-wish is based on James Fenimore Cooper's 1829 novel of the same name. The subject is the novel's Puritan heroine, Ruth Heathcote, who was abducted as a child by the Narragansett Indians. She was raised by the tribe and grew-up safely in their culture, marrying a Narragansett brave named Conanchet and taking the tribal name Narra-matta. The story, however, ends tragically when Ruth's husband is captured and executed whilst saving Ruth's real parents from a rival tribe. After, she is re-united with her family and reverts to Christianity, only to die of a broken heart. Mozier depicts the confusing and ambivalent nature of the heroine's situation at the moment she recognizes her own mother's voice.
At least two other versions are recorded, one dated 1866 in the James H. Ricau Collection, Chrysler Museum of Art, and another, dated 1865, sold Christie's, New York, 4 December 1996, lot 63 ($32,200).