Sara Teasdale Portrait

Sitting Portrait. The Sara Teasdale Collection. ZA Teasdale. Yale Collection of American Literature. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Yale University.

A bronze-colored Countee Cullen is portrayed reaching out to a bust of himself in the traditional representation of a poet: a white marble-colored bust crowned with a laurel wreath. His other hand holds his book Color. The monument rests on a base inscribed with quotations from Cullen's poetry. The composition also owes something to Rembrand's painting of Aristotle contemplating the bust of Homer.  The monument was originally created for an exhibition at the Woodlawn Cemetery where Countee Cullen is buried and it is shown here on that site.