Agriculture (for the St. Louis Exhibition, 1904)

Daniel Jean-Baptiste Dupuis made this bronze medal for the St. Louis Exhibition of 1904. It's small, only about an inch across, but it feels massive because of the way it memorializes that Louisiana Purchase. The face in profile on one side has this dreamy, classical feel, with the hair almost like it’s made of wheat. It’s a beautiful image, but there’s something stiff about it. It reminds me of those old Roman coins where you can tell they were trying to convey power and permanence. You can see these choices in the other side, with its blocky text and almost architectural lines. I see this medal as part of a longer conversation about how we choose to remember things and how we immortalize ideas in art. It has some of the same classical vibes as the work of artists like Poussin, but on a tiny scale.