Marion Sanford

Marion Sanford (February 9, 1904 - 1987) was an American sculptor born to American parents in Guelph, Ontario. She studied painting at the Pratt Institute and sculpture at the Art Students League of New York with Leo Lentelli and direct carving with Robert Laurent[1][2] and worked as an assistant to Brenda Putnam,[3] for whose book The Sculptor's Way she provided pen and ink illustrations.[1] In that book Putnam refers to Sanford as "my pupil, assistant and colleague."[4]

In 1937 her statue, Diana was awarded a prize by the National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors and that same year she won a Guggenheim Fellowship.

During World War II Sanford and her companion Cornelia Chapin redecorated and maintained the former studio of Gutzon Borglum on 32nd Street in New York City. Later they were to move to Lakeville, Connecticut. Their papers are in the Smithsonian Institution's Archives of American Art as the "Marion Sanford and Cornelia Chapin papers, 1929-1988."[5]

In the summer of 1949 she was one of 250 sculptors who exhibited in the 3rd Sculpture International held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Sanford was a founding member of the Sculptors Guild and also a member in the National Sculpture Society and an associate of the National Academy of Design.[6]