Celebrating 20 Years of the Boston Women’s Memorial

About the Boston Women’s Memorial

Artist’s Statement by Sculptor Meredith Bergmann

I work for social justice and historical redress through my art. My commissions include the historic Boston Women’s Memorial, an 8’ tall statue of civil rights icon and great artist Marian Anderson for a college in the South, a heroic-scale portrait of the enslaved child Sally Maria Diggs (“Pinky” in 1860) for the Brooklyn Historical Society, a 1.5 times life size allegorical female September 11^th Memorial for the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, a memorial to Harlem Renaissance poet Countee Cullen that addresses identity and race, the FDR Hope Memorial for Roosevelt Island in a setting designed for use by people of all abilities, and the first statues of historical women for NYC’s Central Park. I am currently creating Something Is Being Done, the first women’s memorial for the historic center of Lexington, MA.

I immerse myself in the world of my subjects, which has enabled me to respond to public feedback and to redesign elements as needed without losing the coherence of the original design. I continue to study and research over the course of the commission—sometimes for years—to retain and deepen my initial enthusiasm and to find symbolic details I can incorporate into the final stages of the work.

My sculptures make a difference in people’s lives. Bostonians leave notes on the Boston Women’s Memorial and put sweaters on the statue of Phillis Wheatley when the weather gets cold. One of my son’s teachers found out that I had made the Memorial to Countee Cullen, installed in the Countee Cullen Branch of the NY Public Library, and exclaimed, “You made this? I saw this on a school trip when I was twelve—I realized for the first time that race is a social construct.” This young woman is now working in social neuroscience.

About Meredith Bergmann

Meredith Bergmann is a sculptor who for over 45 years has been making work that deals with complex themes in an accessible, beautiful and stimulating way. She works both on public monuments and on a private scale. She works for social justice and historical redress through her public art, and seeks out public commissions that explore issues of history, race, human rights and disabilities, as well as the power of poetry and music.

Nick Capasso, director of the Fitchburg Museum, has written: “As a contemporary artist, Meredith Bergmann relies on her knowledge of history and art history, as well as her considerable talent as a figurative sculptor, to forge enriching links between the past and the concerns of the present. Her success as a creator of public art stems from her ability to make free, imaginative use of the forms and symbols of traditional sculpture to address, in complex yet accessible ways, the multi-layered personal and societal concerns of modern life.”

Her public commissions include the 2021 FDR Hope Memorial for Roosevelt Island, NYC, the 2020 Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument for NYC’s Central Park, and the 2003 Boston Women’s Memorial on Commonwealth Avenue in Boston’s Back Bay. Her bronze Memorial to September 11th was installed in New York City’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 2012. She is currently creating Something Is Being Done, the first women’s memorial in the historic center of Lexington, MA.

Her articles, essays and reviews have appeared in The American Arts Quarterly, The New York Review of Art, The Tri Quarterly Review, and Sculpture Review. Her poems have appeared in many journalsand in the anthologies Hot Sonnets,Love Affairs at the Villa Nelle, and Alongside We Travel: Contemporary Poets on Autism, and Powow River Poets Anthology II. She was poetry editor of American Arts Quarterly from 2006-2017. Her chapbook A Special Education was published in 2014 by EXOT Books.

Meredith lives in Massachusetts with her husband, a writer and director, and their son.

For more information, please visit Meredith’s website.