Design For Central Park's First Monument To Women Revealed

CENTRAL PARK, NY — A final design for the first monument in Central Park to honor a woman was revealed this week at the New York Historical Society, the Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony Statue Fund announced.

The statue fund announced that sculptor Meredith Bergmann — who has created statues honoring historic figures such as Abigail Adams, Phillis Wheatley, Lucy Stone and Franklin Delano Roosevelt — was chosen as the winner of its design competition. A model of Bergmann's design will be on display at the New York Historical Society through the end of July.

“I’m honored to have been chosen to make this monument to a movement that transformed our democracy so profoundly from within, and without bloodshed, and that began with two women writing together, composing the most powerful arguments they could imagine. It’s a great subject for a sculpture,” Bergmann said in a statement.

The Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony Woman Suffrage Movement Monument will be the first new commemorative monument in Central Park since 1965. Of the city parks system's 850 monuments, only four currently commemorate the achievements of historic women, according to city Parks Commissioner Mitchell Silver.

The statue will grace the Central Park Mall in 2020, just in time for the 100th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment, which extended the right to vote to women nationwide. While the monument will depict Stanton and Anthony, it will honor all the women who fought for the right to vote and continue to fight for rights such as equal pay for equal work.

A total of 91 artists submitted designs to the Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony Statue Fund design competition. The four finalists — Bergmann, Jane DeDecker, Ann Hirsch and a joint submission by Victoria Guerina and Lloyd Lillie — were revealed in March.

Photo by Glenn Castellano, New-York Historical Society.