Acroteria: Griffin

Alexander Phimister Proctor,

1903–1904

Sheet copper, gilded

Saint Louis Art Museum

A gilded copper sculpture of a griffin sits on a tiled roof under a blue sky. The sculpture is mounted on a rectangular base with metal fixtures. A gilded copper sculpture of a griffin sits on a tiled roof under a blue sky. The sculpture is mounted on a rectangular base with metal fixtures. Two identical sculptures sit majestically atop the Saint Louis Art Museum. Alexander Phimister Proctor created the griffins to adorn the building, originally built as the 1904 World’s Fair Palace of Fine Arts. Griffins—mythological creatures with the head and wings of an eagle and the body of a lion—have been used as architectural embellishments since antiquity. Proctor’s original sculptures were removed in 1993 to protect them from the elements. Two bronze-cast replicas created by Modern