Artwork Details
- Title
- Hudson Bay Wolves
- Artist
- Edward Kemeys (1843-1907)
- Year
- 1872; relocated 1956, 1973, and 2003
- Location
- Philadelphia Zoo, near Bear Country (bear pits); zoo admission (fee) required to view this sculpture
- Medium
- Bronze, on granite base
- Dimensions
- Height 4'2", width 6'10", depth 4'10" (base height 2'6", width 7'9 1/4", depth 5'9")
Artwork Description
*Please note that zoo admission (fee) is required to view this sculpture
Born in Savannah, Georgia, and educated in New York, Edward Kemeys served as captain of artillery in the Union during the Civil War and later with the Engineer Corps in Central Park before embarking on his artistic career. While in New York, he studied modeling and was fascinated by the energy and emotional tension found in animal interaction. His works are considered distinctly American, portraying animals in a direct, naturalistic style.
His group of two wolves fighting over a carcass was the first official acquisition of the newly established Association for Public Art (then known as the Fairmount Park Art Association). Kemeys used the money earned from the commission not to visit Paris, which was the center of sculptural activity at that time, but to travel into the American wilderness. He visited Paris after the Centennial celebration in 1876, but did not like the “approach” or the “caged animals” that he found in the ateliers there.
Content on this page was adapted from Public Art in Philadelphia by Penny Balkin Bach (Temple University Press, 1992). Bach was the longtime Executive Director of the Association for Public Art, working with the organization from 1980 to 2022.
Artwork Credits
Purchased by Association for Public Art (formerly the Fairmount Park Art Association)
Owned by the Philadelphia Zoological Society