The Wrestlers

Beginning in 1908, while attending the American Academy in Rome, Manship first treated the subject of wrestlers. This may have been a direct result to his exposure to ancient Roman sculpture on the theme. His training at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he studied life drawing and figure modeling combined with his admiration for the French sculpture Rodin, gave him a solid grounding in rendering the human form. In this later work, two nude male figures are interlocked in combat.