Audrey Munson

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Audrey Munson
Nude Audrey Munson - Heedless Moths.jpg
Born Audrey Marie Munson
(1891-06-08)June 8, 1891
Rochester, New York, U.S.
Died Script error: The function "death_date_and_age" does not exist.
Ogdensburg, New York, U.S.
Resting place New Haven Cemetery
Nationality American
Occupation Artist's model, actress
Years active 1906–1920

Audrey Marie Munson (June 8, 1891 – February 20, 1996) was an American artist's model and film actress, known variously as "Miss Manhattan", "the Exposition Girl", and "American Venus". She was the model or inspiration for more than fifteen statues in New York City and appeared in four silent films.[1]

Biography

Audrey Marie Munson was born in Rochester, New York, United States, North America, on June 8, 1891.[2] She was not born in Mexico, New York, as is sometimes reported,[citation needed] although her father was from that town and the family did live there. Her parents, Edgar Munson and Katherine "Kittie" Mahaney, divorced when she was young, and Audrey and her mother moved to New York City.[citation needed]

Career

In 1906, when Munson was 15 years old, she was spotted in the street by photographer Ralph Draper, who in turn introduced her to his friend, sculptor Isidore Konti. Konti persuaded the young woman to model for him. For the next decade, Munson became the model of choice for a host of sculptors and painters in New York City. By 1915, she was so well established that she was chosen by Alexander Stirling Calder as the model of choice for the Panama-Pacific International Exposition (PPIE) held that year. She posed for three quarters of the sculptures at that event, as well as for numerous paintings and murals.[citation needed]

In 1915, around the age of 24, probably as a result of her exposure in California at the PPIE, Munson moved to California and entered the nascent film industry, starring in four silent films. The first, Inspiration (1915), the story of a sculptor’s model, was the first time that a woman had appeared fully nude in an American motion picture. The censors were reluctant to ban the film, fearing they would also have to ban Renaissance art. Munson's films were a box office success, although reviews were polarized.[3] Only a single print of one of Munson's films, Purity (1916), has survived.[citation needed]

Munson returned to New York in 1919, around the age of 28. She lived with her mother in a boarding house owned by Dr. Walter Wilkins. Wilkins fell in love with Munson and murdered his wife, Julia, so he could be available for marriage.[1] Although Munson and her mother had left New York prior to the murder, the police still wished to question them, resulting in a nationwide hunt for them. They were finally questioned in Toronto, Canada, where they testified that they had moved out because Mrs. Wilkins had requested it. This satisfied the police, but the negative publicity generated by the case effectively ended Munson's career as a model and actress. Wilkins was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to the electric chair. He hanged himself in his prison cell before the sentence could be carried out.[4]

Suicide attempt

By 1920, when she was 29, Munson, unable to find work anywhere, returned with her mother to the town of Mexico, New York, and worked for a while selling kitchen utensils door to door.[citation needed]

On May 27, 1922, shortly before her 31st birthday, Munson swallowed a solution of bichloride of mercury in an attempt to take her own life.[5] The suicide attempt marked the beginning of her mental illness and paranoia.[citation needed]

Later years and death

In 1931, a judge ordered the 39-year-old Munson into a psychiatric facility for treatment. She was to remain there for the next 65 years, until her death in 1996 at the age of 104.[1]

File:StarASC.jpg
Star Maiden (1915) by A. S. Calder.
Fountain of the Setting Sun (1915) by Weinman.
Civic Fame (1913) by Weinman.
Autumn (1915) by Piccirilli.
File:Straussmemorial.jpg
Isidor and Ida Straus Memorial, (1913) Straus Park by Lukeman.
Pacific (1915) by Calder.
"Day" and "night" Eagle Scout Memorial Fountain, Kansas City, Missouri.

Sculpture

Herbert Adams

Robert Ingersoll Aitken

Karl Bitter

Alexander Stirling Calder

  • Star Maiden (1915) – PPIE - Court of the Universe, now in the Oakland Museum
  • Eastern Hemisphere (1915) – PPIE - Fountain of Energy

Daniel Chester French

Sherry Edmundson Fry

Albert Jaegers

  • Rain (1915) – PPIE
  • Harvest (1915) – PPIE

Carl Augustus Heber

  • Figures on tablet outside the Little Theatre
  • Spirit of Commerce – Manhattan Bridge, NYC

Isidore Konti

  • Mother and Child – private collection of Richard & Lydia Kaeyer
  • Three Muses – Hudson River Museum
  • Three Graces Y– lobby of the Hotel Astor, NYC
  • Pomona – Konti finished the work after Karl Bitter was killed
  • Figure within the Column of Progress (1915) – PPIE
  • Widowhood
  • Genius of Immortality (1911) – Hudson River Museum

Evelyn Beatrice Longman

Augustus Lukeman

Frederick MacMonnies

Allen Newman

Attilio Piccirilli

Firio Piccirilli

  • Fountain of Spring (1915) – PPIE

Frederick Ruckstull

Adolph Alexander Weinman

Albert G. Wenzel

  • Madam Butterfly

Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney

  • The Fountain of El Dorado (1915) – PPIE

Others sculptures at Panama-Pacific International Exposition

  • Fountain of Ceres, Court of Four Seasons
  • Fountain of Rising Sun, Court of Universe
  • Pedestal & Friezes, Columns of Human Progress
  • Air, Court of Universe
  • Spirit of Creation, Court of Universe
  • Nature, Feast of Sacrifice, Court of Four Seasons
  • Pylon Groups, Festival Hall
  • Conception, Wonderment, and Contemplation, Palace of the Fine Arts

Filmography

Purity, newspaper advertisement, October 5, 1916, when Munson was 25 years old.

At one time, all of the films in which Munson appeared were thought to have been lost, but a copy of Purity (1916) was recovered from an archive in France in 2004.[citation needed]

References

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ http://keithyorkcity.wordpress.com/2012/10/25/audrey-munson-miss-manhattan-died-in-obscurity-in-1996/
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ The sculpture was finished by Konti after Bitter’s untimely death.


Bibliography

External links

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