Dover Air Force Base recently erected a sculpture in the meditation garden of the Center for the Families of the Fallen:

The bronze sculpture depicting a guardian angel holding and protecting a wounded soldier will sit in the meditation garden at the Center for the Families of the Fallen. It is meant to serve as a quiet reflection on the sacrifices made by the nation’s fallen soldiers.

The sculpture, called The Angel and the Dying Unknown, was created by Greg Wyatt.  Wyatt is the director of the Newington-Cropsey Foundation’s Academy of Art, as well as sculptor-in-residence for the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York City.

Articles describing the sculpture use words like “rough-hewn” and using “sharp muscular detail with Impressionism’s short, quick strokes” to convey the somewhat atypical presentation:

A rough-hewn angel in bronze has swept down to gather up a fallen soldier whose wide-eyed stare and parted lips say, unmistakably, that life is slipping away…

In Wyatt’s depiction, the divine descends from above to cradle a dying veteran, rewarding his faith with spiritual comfort in the final hour.

The donated sculpture intends to comfort, inspire reflection, and help the grieving process of those who have lost loved ones in military service.

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