Daisy Anna Taake

Daisy Taake was a St. Louis sculptor, painter, and illustrator active in the early 20th century. A St. Louis native, Taake attended the St. Louis School of Fine Arts and later The Art Institute of Chicago. Taake showed great promise as a student, winning the School of Fine Arts’ silver medal in 1911.

Taake was best known in St. Louis for her work in sculpture. She studied under and worked for the internationally renowned sculptor Lorado Taft at the St. Louis School of Fine Arts, who had completed decorative sculptures for the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.

Taake also took to this medium and received several commissions for public sculptures in St. Louis. Among these was the Fountain of Youth, a bronze fountain inspired by Wordsworth’s Intimations of Immortality. The fountain was the first-place winner of a competition for a sculptural fountain in the sunken garden of the St. Louis Public Library, and featured four dancing childlike figures, each representing earth, meadow, grove or stream. The massive bronze sculpture -- twenty feet in diameter -- was never completed because of insufficient funds. Multiple efforts to raise money and find an appropriate home for the sculpture were unfortunately unsuccessful.

Taake’s work possessed a playful energy, as can be seen in the frollicking figures of her proposed fountain design. Apart from her sculpture, Taake was also an accomplished fashion illustrator and commercial artist. Around 1940, Taake's work began to be known nationally. She worked for several Hollywood film companies, producing “stories-in-drawings” for the screen, and several of her works were exhibited at the 1939-1940 New York World's Fair.

Taake’s interests in commercial art and illustration coincided with her teaching. She was a strong advocate for art education, and in a 1976 catalog, the St. Louis Artists’ Guild credited her with introducing commercial art in St. Louis high schools. She taught at McKinley High School, and taught night classes in commercial art at Soldan High School. She died on November 24, 1943, and is buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis.