In the middle of Central Park, there stands an angel.

If you walk to the end of the long mall with its towering old oak trees forming a protective canopy above you, you'll find her.

The angel of Central Park stands guard above Bethesda fountain at the foot of the elegantly sculpted brownstone steps and

arches of the terrace that leads up to her. You can't help but stop and gaze at her. Her wings

are outstretched to their majestic fullest. Her left hand carries a lily symbolizing purity,

and her right hand is reaching out directly to us as if to offer us her support.

She is officially known as the Angel of the Waters, and she first came to Central Park on a May Day of 1873,

and has become an iconic landmark for the city whose populace gathers at her feet. Generations of New Yorkers have come to her, to sit below her on the fountain's edge,

to ask lovers for a hand in marriage, or to try to feel some inkling of the power of healing

that she symbolizes, or to simply enjoy the beauty of a soft spring day. For the tiniest of children,

it is a pure joy that brings them to her with laughter and giggles in anticipation of splashing

their hands in the pool of water gently swirling at her feet. In a modern city, sometimes criticized

for being the least humane of environments in which to live,

she stands strong above at all, an eternal symbol of support, solace, joy, contemplation,

and indeed healing for all who come to gather in her midst.

This episode is ultimately the story of two women, an angel and the sculptor that created her.

While the sculpture of the Angel of the Waters is known to so many New Yorkers and visitors, as is even parts of the story, that it was the first sculpture by a woman erected in public in the city, and that the sculptor was a woman who long before marriage equality established an enduring domestic partnership with another woman.

While bits of these details may be known, there is much, much more to the story.

With the work of a noted journalist, scholar, and author, we now have the fuller,

richer canvas that makes up the story. This is in so many ways not a New York story at all. It's

an Italian story, played out in the drawing rooms and artist studios of Rome in the mid-19th century.

It's a love story of art and humanity

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