Strolling along Rider University's Lawrenceville and Princeton campuses, visitors and members of the campus community will notice new and dramatic elements of vibrant aesthetic appeal.

Taurus (1975)

Four monumental outdoor steel works, on loan to Rider from the estate of world renowned modernist sculptor Isaac Witkin, were installed recently at various sites on both campuses. Two more works will be installed by the end of the summer. All of these works have been exhibited by major international galleries and museums, and were also featured in the hardcover monograph ISAAC WITKIN, by renowned art historian Karen Wilkin, art critic for The Wall Street Journal.

One of the most famous of Witkin's works now on loan to Rider is called Shogun. It is the fourth of four editions with the first three in the permanent collections of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.; the Storm King Art Center, Mountainville, N.Y., and the Tate Gallery in London. All six of the Witkin works on long-term loan to Rider University came directly from the artist's private collection and had been exhibited on his 23-acre blueberry farm in Pemberton, N.J., prior to his sudden and untimely death in 2006.

The works displayed on the Lawrenceville campus are:

• The Hunt (1970), painted steel, located north of the main entrance to Moore Library;
  
  
• Chesterwood (1980), painted steel, located on the green to the south of Moore Library;
  
  
• Shogun (1968), steel, which rests on the knoll in front of the Fine Arts Building on the academic quad; and
  
  
• Night Rupert (1977), painted steel, located behind Moore Library on the walk from the Bart Luedeke Center to the Academic Quad entrance at Memorial Hall;
  
  
• Dirge (1968), steel, will be installed later this summer on a knoll in the Academic Quad adjacent to Sweigert Hall.

The Witkin work installed on the Westminster campus in Princeton is:

• Taurus (1975), painted steel, centered on the main drive in front of Williamson Hall.

A former apprentice to Henry Moore, Witkin is widely recognized as one of the most original and masterful sculptors in the modern era. His evolution as an artist touched upon every major development in modern sculpture throughout his 50-year career. Known as one of the heroes of the New Generation of British artists in the 1960s, Witkin created a new style of modern sculpture with innovative abstract forms that revolutionized the art world. He went on to forge a successful career in America, ultimately developing his own, unique sculptural language.

By 1985, Grace Glueck of The New York Times wrote that Isaac Witkin “long ago worked his way out of aesthetic debt to such mentors as Anthony Caro and David Smith and into a powerful lyrical expression of his own.” Throughout the 1970s, Witkin created innovative and imaginative welded steel works, some of which were inspired by the grandeur of the United States and the Vermont landscapes, as well as his roots in South Africa, where he was born. In 1981, Witkin was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. He went on to receive wide acclaim for his subsequent work in cast and poured bronze.

Chesterwood (1980)

Nadine Witkin, Isaac Witkin's daughter, said the first person she called about placing her father's sculptures after he passed away was Rider University Art Gallery Director and Professor of Arts Harry I Naar. She made that call for mostly sentimental reasons: The last one-man exhibition of Isaac Witkin's life, entitled Out of the Crucible: Images Born of Fire & Water, was at the Rider Art Gallery. Nadine vividly recalled what a wonderful experience her father had at Rider, and in particular, how impressed he was by the curatorial brilliance of Naar, who produced a first-rate exhibition catalog featuring a thoughtful and well-researched interview with her father.

“It really was an amazing coincidence,” said Nadine. “When I called Harry about my father's work, he told me he had just called the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton inquiring about the possibility of acquiring Isaac's modern sculptures to adorn Rider's campuses. He was so excited that literally within minutes, Harry called Julie Karns (Rider's vice president for finance), who contacted William Chickering (dean of Rider University Libraries) and Phil Voorhees (assistant vice president of facilities operations and construction management). They were all on board right away.”

Within days, the Rider team, along with Jose Alminana of Andropogon Associates, the Philadelphia landscape architecture firm advising the university, traveled to Isaac Witkin's farm in Pemberton to hand pick the works.

“I felt very much that this was meant to be; it's like all the stars were perfectly aligned, and Rider is the ideal place for my father's pieces,” said Nadine. “I could not have dreamed of a more worthy and appreciative venue, and I could not have invented a nicer and more professional group of people to work with on this project.”

“My father was obsessed with introducing sculpture to people who might otherwise not get the chance to be exposed to it. He curated art exhibitions at hospitals, and he once even organized a sculpture show at the Burlington County Prison. He would have been honored that these historic works from his personal collection have the distinction of being the first long-term sculpture installations at Rider University, and he would have welcomed the opportunity to make such a significant impact on the community.”

Nadine said she was very pleased with the placement of all of her father's work, and in particular, she was thrilled with the location Dean Chickering and his team had selected for Witkin's semi-autobiographical steel work called Taurus, a massive, powerful painted steel work created in 1975 that was first exhibited at Marlborough Gallery in New York City.

Taurus, which refers to her father's zodiac sign, is now perched dramatically on top of the hill at the entrance to Westminster Choir College in Princeton. “When I got out of the car to see the piece, I heard the beautiful operatic voices of the Westminster choir students echoing out of the windows in the background, and I welled up with emotion,” she said. Westminster seems a fitting location for the piece since her father was an opera lover and amateur baritone singer, who actually had formal vocal training. Many of his other sculptures, such as Firebird, The Linden Tree, and Madame Butterfly, have operatic titles and motifs.

“It was my birthday, and I happened to be accompanied by the acting chief curator of one of the biggest sculpture collections in America. He was visiting my father's works at Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton for the first time, and wanted to see the Rider installation as well. It was as if the whole scene had been specially choreographed just for us, but, of course, it hadn't been!”

Isaac Witkin's work is currently on exhibit at the Tate Gallery in London, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Smithsonian American Museum, Laumeier Park, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Sydney, Australia, and many other public and private collections worldwide.

The Grounds for Sculpture, which Witkin helped to establish, features six of his monumental bronze works in its permanent collection. Rider University's close proximity to the Hamilton location makes a broad array of Isaac Witkin's steel, bronze and stone works available to scholars and the public.

 

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