Trilon
$1,000 Down Payment
Full Price: 10,000.00
Description
Sculpture
signed Steffen Thomas (top)
Titled Trilon
Cast bronze
14 inches by 5.5 inches by 5.25 inches
Date ca 1950
Limited edition of 50 – 24 cast as of September 2019
Casting #
Provenance
2007 Steffen Thomas Museum of Art authenticated this version of Trilon owned by a private collector. Limited edition of 50 bronze Trilons, established by Steffen Thomas Art Representatives (STAR). First castings made at Mengle Foundry, Marietta, Georgia 2011. Additional castings made by Inferno Foundry, Union City, Georgia for Steffen Thomas Art Representatives (STAR).
A heroic-scale model of Trilon was produced by Thomas in cement, covered in welded copper. That piece is in the collection of the City of Atlanta and is installed as a fountain, located in the median at the intersections of Peachtree and 15th Streets. In 1975, Walter Smith, President of the Ansley Park Civic Association wrote, “A three sided sculpture by Steffen Thomas, representing the struggle of man breaking his bondage, has been installed at the [Ansley Park] fountain location. You will see a single figure within the three sides becoming a multitude of silhouettes when viewed from each side. Inspired by Michelangelo’s David, Mr. Thomas says the sculpture will be the center of an umbrella of water.” This Trilon won the 1976 Atlanta Urban Design Commission Award for Public Sculpture.
“Each man is a star --. Hostility and madness are the barriers to the achievements of desired ends.” These ideas were expressed by Steffen Thomas when he spoke of Trilon in an interview with Andrew Hayes, co-author of, Steffen Thomas: The Freedom of the Figure. The figures in the sculpture depict striving to achieve without the presence of those barriers. The viewer can see that the artist has definitely departed from his Classical training by this time and embraces an expressionistic style, which gives him much more freedom to explore the realm of the human psyche.
Museum consultant and curator, Alan Aiches, writes about Trilon in The Art of Steffen Thomas, “Particularly apparent in Thomas’s paintings and noticeable in his sculpture, as well, are the regimentation with profile and the element of scale. These are the direct result of a rigorous foundation in drawing and Thomas’s work in sculpture. The profile becomes the natural element that holds seemingly undisciplined looking works together compositionally. These compressed or closed compositions are indicated by the use of the shrine, the painted window, or in some cases, a carved frame, and they reiterate Thomas’s need for security. Scale is subtly suggested in… the bronze maquette for Trilon, where the image takes up nearly the entire surface of… the sculpture.”
Exhibited
- Wilmington, North Carolina — St. Johns Museum, The Freedom of the Figure, 1983, curated by Alan Aiches
- New York, New York — Broome Street Gallery, The Art of Steffen Thomas, October 1999, curated by Anthony F. Janson
- Laurel, Mississippi — Lauren Rogers Museum of Art, The Art of Steffen Thomas, December 2000 – January 2001
- Athens, Georgia — Athens Academy Harrison Art Center
- Steffen Thomas: A Retrospective - Works from 1946 - 1988, August 2013 – May 2014
- New Orleans, Louisiana — Ogden Museum of Southern Art, Steffen Thomas Rediscovered, January 2014 - April 2014, catalog page 125, illustrated
- Augusta, Georgia — The Morris Museum of Art, Steffen Thomas Rediscovered, April 2015 – July 2015
- Atlanta, Georgia — Gallery 72 City of Atlanta Office of Cultural Affairs, Steffen Thomas: A Legacy in Atlanta, June 2017 – September 2017
- Atlanta, Georgia — Goethe Institute, Steffen Thomas: A Legacy in Atlanta, June 2017 – September 2017
STAR #7206