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Bronze at U's Bell Museum honors sculptor, animals

By Paul Walsh

December 13, 2011 at 1:52AM

A new sculpture at the University of Minnesota’s Bell Museum of Natural History honors 10 signature animals of Minnesota and Samuel H. Bell, a son of the museum’s namesake, who sculpted the same animals on the museum’s exterior. (Dennis McGrath/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

A 200-pound sculpture was installed on Monday at the University of Minnesota's Bell Museum of Natural History that honors 10 signature animals of Minnesota and a son of the museum's namesake.

The bronze piece, measuring nearly 5 1/2 feet tall and 3 feet across, stands on a pedestal at the museum's popular Northwoods plaza.

Designed by sculptor Ian Dudley of Lindstrom, Minn., the artwork includes carvings of 10 animals: bear, beaver, buffalo, crane, eagle, owl, pelican, raccoon, squirrel and wolf. Those 10 also have long been represented in stone on the museum's façade.

At the center of the new sculpture is a portrait of Samuel H. Bell (1910-87), son of the museum's namesake, James Ford Bell. The younger Bell was commissioned in 1939 to sculpt models for the figures that are on the facade.

PAUL WALSH