HOLLYHOCK HOUSE ROMAN REPLICA
Plaster replica of Three Dancing Nymphs, a 1st-century A.D. marble relief from Roman Libya, at Hollyhock House, Hollywood, California.
Hollyhock House was Frank Lloyd Wright’s first project in Los Angeles. The house is now a museum, and in 2019 was recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the first work of modern American architecture to be so designated.
The two thousand year-old marble relief, Three Dancing Nymphs, was the most important work of art in Hollyhock House’s original owner’s art collection. It was the last major feature missing from the house’s recent restoration back to its original 1920s decor. The ancient artefact has changed hands in the hundred years since the house’s construction. It is now owned by the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, and currently on loan to the Getty Center.
Hollyhock House hired Concept Realizations to produce an exacting replica for permanent display in the loggia where the original once stood, and where it would be the first work of art to greet visitors.
Concept Realizations directed the 3D scanning of the original marble at the Getty Center in May, 2016, and used the 3D data to robotically mill a slab of plaster. We hand-carved additional details and hand-painted the plaster to match the original marble.
After its installation, the curator of Hollyhock House commented, “From start to finish you have made an amazing copy. From the scans to the milling and refining process, to the coloring, it all came together in a most amazing manner. The result is rather like perfection. I think our visitors, without really knowing, will instinctively know this too.”
This project was done in cooperation with the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the Barnsdall Art Park Foundation, which operates Hollyhock House.
