CC0 · no rights reserved
The Falling Gladiator
From the collection of Smithsonian American Art Museum. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
William Rimmer based this sculpture of a mortally wounded man on works from ancient Greece and Rome. But its subject echoed the suffering of the United States on the eve of war. When the artist began work in January of 1861, six states had seceded from the Union, and the attack on Fort Sumter was just three months away. Rimmer worked as a doctor, and his critics at first accused him of casting the sculpture on a real human body.
Smithsonian American Art Museum’s own descriptionSubjects
Credit lineThe Falling Gladiator. 1861. William Rimmer, born Liverpool, England 1816-died South Milford, MA 1879. Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Caroline Hunt Rimmer. CC0.
