Life After Life: The Psychic Sculptor

The Object

In 1852, Harriet Hosmer packs her pistol, her anatomy degree, and two pictures of a sculpture she made and moves to Rome. There, among other “emancipated women” in the expat colony, she becomes one of the world’s most famous artists. But it’s the spirit world that truly calls to her, the realm of the dead that she channels through clairvoyance and seances. So what happens when she answers? You can see her remarkably tender sculpture of Medusa, referenced in this episode, in the collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art: https://collections.artsmia.org/art/81074/medusa-harriet-goodhue-hosmer Learn more about “Supernatural America,” the exhibition organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Art and featuring Hosmer’s Medusa, opening June 2021 at the Toledo Museum of Art: https://new.artsmia.org/exhibition/supernatural-america-the-paranormal-in-american-art