Lindsay Daen; Sculptor Did Major Work in Puerto Rico

Lindsay Daen, whose elegant, elongated sculptures grace monuments, museums and private collections from his adopted Puerto Rico to Europe and Australia, has died. He was 78.

Daen died April 24 of cancer in Sarasota, Fla., his widow, Laura, said Tuesday. She said she had delayed announcing his death until she returned to their principal home in San Juan.

Born in 1923 in Dunedin, New Zealand, Daen was raised in Australia, where he attended art school and showed his work for the first time at the Adelaide Art School. He immigrated to the United States in 1949.

He displayed his bronze sculptures at shows in St. Louis, New York and Houston, and in New Orleans, where he moved in the 1950s.

In 1955, Puerto Rican Gov. Luis Munoz Marin invited Daen to bring the first major show of sculpture to the island. He made San Juan his home in 1956.

His most recent public works displayed in San Juan are “Juan Bobo y la Canasta” (Juan Bobo and the Basket), a 1999 sculpture depicting a Puerto Rican child legend, and “Joven con Pajaros” (Youth With Birds), installed in a beachside park last year.

Daen worked in studios in San Juan, Madrid and Princeton, N.J., and in Sarasota, where he had a second home. He had shows throughout the United States and in Sydney and Mexico City.

His second wife, Loulette, died in 1977. He met his third wife, Laura Ann Ross of Philadelphia, in 1984. He is also survived by a son, Paul.