“Who is Billy Graham?”
The question came to Chas Fagan as a 6-year-old from a new friend in Belgium. It was the early 1970s, and his family had just moved to Brussels from Pennsylvania.
“I only knew two things,” Fagan said. “He tells stories from the Bible. And he’s American.”
Little did Fagan know that over a half century later, he would begin an extraordinary journey as the official sculptor of Billy Graham’s statue, which now resides in the U.S. Capitol as part of the National Statuary Hall Collection in Washington, D.C.
And while he never met Billy Graham face-to-face, he began a serious, five-year mission to uncover the man behind the globally known name.
“I spent a lot of time ‘with’ Billy Graham,” Fagan told the crowd Monday at the Billy Graham Library—studying mannerisms, facial expressions,
even the way his suit coats fit his broad shoulders over the decades.
‘Very Inviting’
Fagan waded through hours of video. He pored over countless images and artifacts.
“How’s he going to stand?” Fagan said. “If he was a fencer he definitely would be lunging with his left foot.”
Fagan was struck by how “vertical” the 6-foot-3-inch preacher looked, especially in his early decades. “He didn’t change much from the ’40s to the ’70s.”
“Now the pose,” said Fagan, who showed the crowd many images of Billy Graham pointing. “But it was very instructional and domineering. It just didn’t feel right.”
Fagan still remembers the quest for the perfect stance, likening it to “detective work.” Then one day he came across an image that inspired the finished product. “He’s gesturing with his right hand to the Bible in his left hand.”
But there was one detail that caught Fagan’s eye and closed the deal.
“His hand was open. It’s very inviting,” said Fagan of a man whose ministry was marked by inviting people to receive Christ by faith.
‘Detail in Every Little Wrinkle’
As any artist can attest, it’s the facial expressions that are the most challenging—and memorable. Fagan spent untold hours on the most intricate of facial details, from the distinct jawline and flowing hair to his eyes and brow.
But it was the mouth that took the most work to get just right. “I didn’t want him smiling,” Fagan said.
Smiles may be nice in person, but on a statue, they don’t invite second looks or encourage lingering glances. Instead, he settled on a more neutral look that he kept seeing after Billy Graham would preach.
“It’s as if he’s looking at every single person individually,” Fagan said. “It’s like he’s at the beginning of a thought—and you’re waiting for him to speak again.”
“He put detail in every little wrinkle,” said Catrina Dowdy, who drove 3 ½ hours from Erwin, North Carolina, for Monday’s event. “To put Galatians on the Bible … he realised that every little detail matters.”
And now, in the lower section of National Statuary Hall, where Capitol tours begin, it’s estimated that some 30,000 people will walk past the sculpture of Billy Graham on a daily basis.
They will see two of Billy Graham’s favourite Scripture verses chiselled on the sides of the base—John 3:16 and John 14:6.
“The Gospel is still going out, non-stop,” Dowdy said.
He put detail in every little wrinkle. To put Galatians on the Bible … he realised that every little detail matters.
—Catrina Dowdy about Billy Graham statue sculptor Chas Fagan
About the Artist
A Soviet Union major at Yale University, Fagan took one short trip to Russia to realise he needed to find a different career.
So, the naturally gifted artist tried his hand at political cartoons and then landscape art and portraits.
But it wasn’t until 1998 that he began his sculpting career—almost by a fluke.
He was interviewing for a job with C-SPAN to do a portrait of Alexis de Tocqueville, French author of “Democracy in America.” At the back of his portfolio, he had included a pencil sketch of a Tocqueville statue that he did “just for fun.”
“It was very quiet and then they saw the sketch and within minutes I was signing a contract to do a statue,” Fagan said.
In 2009, he sculpted Ronald Reagan for Statuary Hall, his first for the Capitol.
Having two works in Statuary Hall is almost unbelievable for Fagan. “It’s such a high honour,” he said of being the Billy Graham sculptor.
Today Fagan has a much different perspective on the evangelist and would have a lot more to say if a friend asked him, “Who is Billy Graham?”
“When I got older, I realised the power of his message and the need for faith,” Fagan said. “Billy Graham was just a man, but he made such an impact in this world.”
When I got older, I realised the power of his message and the need for faith. Billy Graham was just a man, but he made such an impact in this world.
—Chas Fagan, sculptor