Thomas Waldo Story

Though born in Italy, Thomas Waldo Story was of American heritage; his father was the distinguished neo-classical sculptor William Wetmore Story.  Waldo Story attended Eton and Oxford and mingled with expatriate artists living and practicing in Rome around his father, and they introduced him to an impressive group of British aristocratic patrons, including the Marlboroughs at Blenheim, Lord Durham at Lambton Castle and the Astors at Cliveden.  As was Story’s good friend James Abbott MacNeill Whistler, Story was often commissioned by his wealthy patrons to create complete decorative programs for the grand homes of his wealthy patrons. In particular, Story’s work for Lord Rothschild’s Tring billiard room reflects the demand for panels very similar to the present pair of friezes of Paris and Helen and Horse Race in the Isthmian Games.  Described in a 1903 review, the billiard room’s “commission at once gave scope to the artist’s feeling for form and taste in decoration.  The room… is lined with white marble panels, sculptured in low relief”  (E. March Phillips, “Waldo Story: Sculptor,” The Magazine of Art, 1903, vol. XIII, p. 137).  These panels represented Pegasus surrounded by the Muses and Diana hunting with her attendant nymphs along with figures of Endymion, Hebe, Cupid and Pysche, all “delicate and harmonious studies of line…broken by the vigorous modeling” of forms (Phillips, p. 139).  While the present pair cannot be directly connected to the Tring group, they are very similar in Classical subject and spirit, as evidenced by their shallow carved, well-modeled figures assembled in a rhythmic composition with decorative elements of billowing scarves, tossed floral wreaths, and flowing hair.  Though not an exact transcription of known historical and mythological models, Paris and Helen and Horse Race in the Isthmian Games are certainly inspired by the riders, soldiers, chariots and allegorical maidens from ancient sites.  Indeed, Story was deeply influenced by Rome and its rich history, which he encountered each day just outside his studio. The artist especially prized this pair of panels, which he submitted to the Grosvenor Gallery exhibition of 1882.  Story also found inspiration among such fellow exhibitors as Albert Moore and Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, along with his circle of friends including Whistler, Oscar Wilde and other proponents of aestheticism.  Story does not attempt to re-create archeological artifacts; rather his work can be easily appreciated for the pure beauty of highly decorated creamy white marble. This quality was not overlooked by contemporary admirers.  Wilde wrote to Story that Whistler “spoke of your art with more enthusiasm that I have ever heard him speak of any modern work,” while reviews explained Story’s “work is full of the inspiration and suggestion of Italy… And so, too, Rome, the Rome of the last rich lingering of the Renaissance, and the Rome that we see to-day….in the end one is led back again and again to the classic; the true rest to eye and mind, the inexhaustible well-spring of beauty" (Phillips, p. 275).