A Mural Carved in Stone

Abstract

The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts appears as both a fortress and a temple of art and caused a sensation when it opened in 1876. While much has been written about the building and its principal architect Frank Furness, there is scant mention of the six carved metopes on the building's exterior that replicate Paul Delaroche's 1853 Hemicycle in the Ecole des Beaux-Arts's Salle des Prix. This essay explores how the carved appropriation of the Hemicycle, which as early as 1855 was acclaimed in the United States as "one of the most remarkable works which painting has ever produced," signaled the Academy's function and purpose, and why a copy of a French mural painting carved in stone was deemed appropriate for the exterior of an American museum and art school.