Adolph Alexander Weinman
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Adolph Alexander Weinman (December 11, 1870 – August 8, 1952) was an American sculptor, born in Karlsruhe, Germany on . He arrived in the United States at age 10 after which he studied at Cooper Union and Art Students League and with sculptors Augustus St. Gaudens and Philip Martiny. He later served as an assistant to Charles Niehaus, Olin Warner and Daniel Chester French. Although Weinman is now best known as a numismatist, when he was once introduced as such he vehemently denied being one and said that he was an architectural sculptor. Despite his objections he is still best remembered as the designed of the half dollar and dime along with various medals for the Armed Services. Weinman was one of many sculptors and artists who employed Audrey Munson as a model.
As an architectural sculptor, his work can be found on the Wisconsin, Missouri and Louisiana State Capitol Buildings. He became the sculptor of choice for the architects McKim, Mead, and White and designed sculpture for their Municipal Building, Madison Square Presbyterian Church and Pennsylvania Railway Station, all in New York City. A photograph of one of his angles in a landfill in New Jersey is one of the saddest reminders of the destruction of Penn Station in 1966. Elsewhere he created the dramatic frieze on the Elks National Shrine in Chicago and executed sculpture of the Post Office Department Building and the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington D.C.
His non-architectural works include the Macomb and the Maybury monuments in Detroit, Michigan.
Weinman works are mostly in a sort of lyrical classical style. His figures typically are found wearing Greco-Roman clothing, but there is a fluidity found in his work that is a harbinger of the art deco style that was to follow him.
References
- Architectural Sculpture of the United States, Einar Einarsson Kvaran, unpublished manuscript
External links
- First Bank (http://www.wiu.edu/art/public_art/html/firstbank.html)