On the second floor of the St. Louis Art Museum, Chauncey Bradley Ives’ "Undine Receiving Her Soul" stands among a strong legacy of nude, allegorical women in sculpture. Undine, contextualized by Fredrich de la Motte Fouqué’s novella, falls into a category of nude female figures that played to Euro-American societal expectations of women. The story centers on her transformation from a water nymph into a Christian wife, with her then being in between these two worlds. Undine’s liminality and captivity between humanity and the water spirits play on existent themes of Native American and white settler relations, as expanded on with Ives’ "The Willing Captive." Much like the success of other female captives in the 19th-century sculpture, Ives creates Undine into a paradigm of Christian womanhood and wifely duty. However, her depiction is hypocritical, as these duties oppose her nature as a water nymph. In contrast to Ives’ "The Willing Captive", Undine serves as a sort of “Unwilling Captive,” with her liminality and captivity forming her into a sympathetic character that emphasizes Christian values to a Euro-American audience. Ultimately, Ives’ depictions of Undine stand on the shoulder of previously popularized depictions of captivity and liminality in 19th-century art, with Undine’s liminal state adding to her victimhood and her reading as both an unwilling captive and a pious Christian wife.

Dr. Bradley Bailey has been a consistent source of support for Weronika throughout the process of writing her paper. This paper originated in Dr. Bailey’s American Art: Colonial to WWII class, which Weronika took during her freshman year. This was the class that pushed Weronika to pursue an Art History minor. After much reflection and inquiry, she chose to revisit “Undine,” with Dr. Bailey’s encouragement, as part of his 19th-Century Art class. Additionally, Dr. Bailey has served as a mentor and guide, assisting Weronika in her journey towards continued academic scholarship in graduate school.