Lot Details
Lot 259
American Art Deco Bronze Figure of Mercury
Cast from a model by Joseph H. Freedlander, circa 1931
On an oak base. Height 16 1/2 inches.
In the February 2, 1997, New York Times Article, Mystery of 104 Bronze Statues of Mercury, the author, Christopher Gray questions what became of the gilt-bronze figures of Mercury that surmounted the traffic lights on the corners of Fifth Avenue from 8th Street to 59th Street from 1931 when the first was installed to 1964 when the last was removed. The slender bronze posts and their Mercurys were supposedly destroyed for scrap, but it seems not all of the figures have disappeared. One has been preserved by the Fifth Avenue Association, two are in the Museum of the City of New York, two have been sold at Sotheby's, New York, and now a sixth is being offered here.
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