Angel Gabriel and Mary by Almuth Lutkenhaus

Provenance:
The Estate of Margaret Laurence
Private Collection, Toronto

Literature:
David Staines, “Margaret Laurence: Critical Reflections”, University of Ottawa Press, 2001, page 152

This single-produced maquette was a gift to author Margaret Laurence as thanks for the writer’s support of the sculptor through the controversy which arose from the mounting of one of her sculpture in a Toronto church:

“[Laurence] was involved in a great stir over the mounting of Canadian sculptor Lutkenhus-Lackey’s ‘Crucified Woman’ in the Bloor Street United Church during Easter Week, 1979. In that sculpture, which now stands publicly on the grounds of Emmanuel College, Toronto, Margaret saw a recognition by the Christian community of the terrible agonies suffered by women as victims. She knew all about that, and wrote passionately and sensitively about it in her novels.”

Lutkenhaus later produced a bronze bust of Laurence in 1984, one of which was donate to the collection of the National Gallery of Canada.