Hendrik Christian Andersen

Hendrik Christian Andersen (15 April 1872 in Bergen – 19 December 1940 in Rome) was a Norwegian-American sculptor, painter and urban planner. Background Andersen was born in Bergen, Norway to parents Anders Andersen from Lærdal and Helene Monsine Monsen from Bergen. He emigrated as an infant with his family to Newport, Rhode Island the following year. As a young man in Newport, Andersen began his work as a sculptor and learned to mingle among the city's wealthy elite, including serving as an art instructor for Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. In 1893, Andersen traveled to Europe to study art and eventually settled in Rome. There he ingratiated himself with other artists as well as a number of wealthy expatriate patrons and pursued his work. The World City Andersen's sculpture, paintings, and writings demonstrate a fondness for large monumental classically inspired pieces, which, he believed, stirred in the viewer a desire for self-improvement. Much of his work was done in contemplation of the single idea of designing a perfect "World City," filled with art, which would motivate humanity to achieve a near-Utopian state. His urban planning philosophy is evident in his 1913 A World Center of Communication. This enormous tome (the text weighed over ten pounds) was written with Ernest Hébrard and grew out of Andersen's earlier writing, The Fountain of Life. Central to the work was Andersen's belief that art, more specifically monumental Beaux-Arts architecture, could bring about world peace and international harmony. The plan called for the creation of a central world capital. In his words, the city would be "a fountain of overflowing knowledge to be fed by the whole world of human endeavour in art, science, religion, commerce, industry, and law; and in turn to diffuse throughout the whole of humanity as though it were one grand, divine body conceived by God, the vital requirements which would renew its strength, protect its rights, and enable it to attain greater heights through a concentration of world effort."