Art Commission praises Alvin Pettit’s Harriet Tubman statue design and gives final approval at first presentation

The Philadelphia Art Commission has voted unanimously to give final approval to the concept and design for the new Harriet Tubman statue proposed by sculptor Alvin Pettit.

Last Wednesday, Art Commission members, who praised Pettit’s presentation for its ideas, voted unanimously to approve the design of the statue after just one meeting to discuss it. Seven members of the commission were present. The commission’s website lists nine members.

Pettit is a Jersey City-based sculptor whose statue design, A Higher Power: The Call of a Freedom Fighter, was selected from five finalists in October 2023 after a yearlong process.

At the virtual meeting Wednesday, Pettit said he researched Tubman’s history and also looked at existing statues featuring her. He concluded that most statues depict her as either running away from enslavement, or helping others escape.

“I wanted to take it in a new direction that I had not seen before and that was unique to Philadelphia,” Pettit said in the recorded meeting.

“I wanted to change the narrative and to show her not necessarily on the run anymore. I wanted to show her as a conqueror, as a woman who defied the odds and actually conquered her oppressors.”

That’s why, he said, he based the statue’s design on an aspect of Tubman’s history that is not told as often: that she was a Civil War soldier, nurse and spy.

He specifically drew from her actions leading a battalion of 150 men in the Combahee Ferry Raid in South Carolina, where she helped lead about 700 enslaved people to freedom.

“She was a military soldier and she led men into battle,” he said.

With the Tubman statue added to the northeast apron of City Hall, he said, Tubman would join two other Civil War soldiers: Gen. George McClellan and Major Gen. John Fulton Reynolds. He described this as a three-soldier sentry of guardians outside the “palace” of City Hall.

Pettit also explained the inspiration for the pose of the statue, which shows Tubman in an almost kneeling position with her hands in a prayer-like clasp.

He pointed out that, to some, the Tubman figure may appear to be in prayer, but a viewer getting closer to the statue will see that one hand is clasped over the other, which could also be interpreted as a woman who is showing determination.

Another inspiration was a painting of Gen. George Washington, The Prayer at Valley Forge, which depicts Washington bending on one knee, praying in the woods. The maquette, or two-foot model, of Pettit’s design doesn’t show Tubman actually kneeling, but she has one knee bent at the same angle, while standing on a mound of broken chains and shackles.

Pettit said he was motivated to nod to the George Washington painting by telling the commissioners that if Washington is seen as a “father of the country,” then Tubman can be seen as a “mother of freedom.”

The artist also said there would be community involvement by his participation in lectures at Philadelphia schools. And it might be possible to allow Philadelphia students to visit his Jersey City studios to watch or assist in some of the preparation of the statue.

Pettit said he is working with the city’s Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy (OACCE) to allow the public to help decide which of Tubman’s quotes may be inscribed on the statue’s base.

For example, two of the quotes he presented to the commission were these:

“For no man should take me alive. I should fight for my liberty as long as my strength lasted.” And: " I would give every drop of blood in my veins to free them.”

The Tubman statue is to be 11 feet tall, in bronze with a graying-brown patina. It will be installed on a granite base, 2½ to 3 feet high.

One commissioner questioned whether the installation would interfere with SEPTA infrastructure running beneath the City Hall plaza.

Another was concerned whether any part of the statue, especially the mound of broken chains, could be broken off or stolen, or whether people could sit on the pedestal while taking a cigarette break.

Pettit said that he has considered those possibilities and that there would be no flat surfaces where people could sit.

After his presentation, commission member Sarah McEneaney, who is an artist, said: “I think it’s absolutely beautiful.”

» READ MORE: Sculptor Alvin Pettit will design the new Harriet Tubman statue in Philadelphia

Commissioner Malcolm Jordan-Miller Kenyatta asked whether the plaque accompanying the statue would include more specifics about Tubman’s history in Philadelphia.

“I’m really proud of this piece and I love the community engagement,” Kenyatta said.

Chair Robert Roesch also praised the design and said, “I’m inclined to let this go through without having him come back.”

That means he was in favor of giving Pettit’s design final approval right away. But the commission did ask that it get to review the wording on the plaque before it is installed.

Marguerite Anglin, the city’s public art director, agreed that the wording on the plaque will be brought back to the commission. “There’s no question that Philadelphia played a significant role [in Tubman’s life]. It’s the place where she first found freedom.”

The city’s OACCE said Friday that with the Art Commission’s approval, it now has the authority to enter into a contract with Pettit for a $500,000 commission. But it could take a few months for the contract to be signed. The statue is expected to be completed in 2025.

» READ MORE: Who is Alvin Pettit, the artist chosen for Philly’s Harriet Tubman statue?

Pettit was chosen following a controversy that arose in 2022 after then-Mayor Jim Kenney and the OACCE selected another artist, who is white, to create a permanent statue of Tubman without having a public call to seek other designs, particularly from Black sculptors.

In a news release about the commission’s approval, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said: “Her recognition and this work of art in her honor, created by an artist of color, is overdue and welcomed. …

“As the first-ever woman mayor of Philadelphia and as a Black woman, I am thrilled that the first piece of public art to be approved under this administration will be this statue of a Black woman who fought for freedom here in Philadelphia — Harriet Tubman.”

This story has been updated to correct the last name of Civil War U.S. Army Major General John Fulton Reynolds.