Green-Wood

The newest piece of sculpture at Green-Wood is Sopladora Grande, a 2005 piece by Javier Marin.  She was a gift to Green-Wood from Michel Langlais, President of National Sculpture Society.  Sopladora Grande joins the myriad of world-class sculpture and architecture at the National Historic Landmark in Brooklyn, NY.

Green-Wood is home to a significant body of sculpture created by National Sculpture Society members.  These include the Minerva Statue / “Altar to Liberty” by Frederick Wellington Ruckstuhl, the Hiram and William Fogg Memorial marble bas-relief portraits by J.Q.A Ward and the David Stewart Tomb bas-reliefs by Augustus Saint-Gaudens.  More information and images of the works are available online.

Founded in 1838, Green-Wood was one of the first rural cemeteries in America. By the early 1860s, it had earned an international reputation for its magnificent beauty and became the prestigious place to be buried, attracting 500,000 visitors a year, second only to Niagara Falls as the nation’s greatest tourist attraction. Crowds flocked there to enjoy family outings, carriage rides, and sculpture viewing in the finest of first generation American landscapes. Green-Wood’s popularity helped inspire the creation of public parks, including New York City’s Central and Prospect Parks.

Green-Wood is 478 spectacular acres of hills, valleys, glacial ponds and paths, throughout which exists one of the largest outdoor collections of 19th- and 20th-century statuary and mausoleums. A magnet for history buffs and bird watchers, Green-Wood is a Revolutionary War historic site, a designated site on the Civil War Discovery Trail and a registered member of the Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary System. On September 27, 2006, Green-Wood was designated a National Historic Landmark by the United States Department of the Interior, which recognized its national significance in art, architecture, landscaping and history.