Master sculptor Sabin Howard designed, created, and sculpted A Soldier’s Journey, the heart of the WWI Memorial to be installed in Washington, DC next month
Widely known as America’s Michelangelo, Howard designed a 38-figure relief that tells the story of a doughboy leaving his family, entering the fray of battle, suffering the sorrowful toll of war, and then returning home, transformed but victorious.
The relief stretches nearly 60’ across the National WWI Memorial Park, formerly known as Pershing Park, and stands 10’ high. Howard sculpted the figures to heroic scale, with the tallest figure, the Shellshocked Soldier, reaching 7’6” in height.
Howard sculpts in the ancient tradition of figurative art: by hand from a live model posed in front of him on a modeling stand. His tools range from clay rakes and serrated-edge knives to delicate, Italian-crafted implements that resemble scalpels. He uses green-tinted, sulfur-free plastilina clay.
Each of his thirty-eight figures was carefully selected and designed to fit within the gorgeous and symphonic composition of A Soldier’s Journey. And each figure was given a nickname and a loose back-story by Howard, his assistant sculptor Charlie Mostow, the models, and the other denizens of the sculpture studio. In process, the clay figures were actual characters to the studio folks.
The Daughter in Howard’s magnificent monument is both alpha and omega. She is the first figure of the 38, handing his helmet to her father as he kneels before her, saying farewell and receiving her love and blessings. She is also the last figure in the relief, receiving the helmet back from her weary, war-transformed father when he returns from the Great War.
The Daughter is the only figure who appears twice. She is the next generation, America’s hopes and dreams for its future. In the final scene of the relief, when she looks into the helmet, she divines what is to come: World War II. The tragic irony of the War to End All Wars is that it ushered in a century of fatal strife.
Howard sculpted the Daughter from his own daughter Madeleine. Madeleine was 11 years old at the beginning of Howard’s nine-year marathon of designing, creating, and sculpting A Soldier’s Journey. When Howard sculpted her for the final scene, Madeleine was already enrolled in college. Howard relied on his extraordinary visual memory to sculpt his girl as she had appeared nearly a decade earlier.
Madeleine maintained her good humor throughout the years that she modeled in the studio, where she also did her remote learning during the COVID era, swept floors and washed dishes, and assisted in making the documentary Heroic: Sabin Howard Sculpts the National WWI Memorial (releasing next spring).
Howard’s relief is replete with personal stories that impart greater significance to the breathtakingly-sculpted work. Veterans of today in particular have thanked Howard and his team for including the families of service people. Veterans are grateful to have their family members' sacrifice acknowledged.
As Jack Fowler of the National Review writes, “The work of renowned sculptor Sabin Howard, who just may be the coolest dude one could ever meet, the 58-foot-long, multi-figured, way-beyond life-sized bronze work, A Soldier’s Journey, is as engrossing and dramatic as it will be vast and beautiful.”
Rebecca DeSimone, Esquire
Sabin Howard Sculpture LLC
rdrosebud@gmail.com
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Sabin Howard Sculpts the Daughter