JEFFERSON IN RETIREMENT
(profile, closeup)

MEDIUM:
Painted clay model, 20"H

TYPE OF WORK:
Portrait

COMMENTS:
Thus I found myself committed in good conscience to the challenge of attempting a portrait of Thomas Jefferson which might somehow include the contradiction of slavery. After considerable research, including a visit to the Jefferson Library in Charlottesville, Virginia, I found what I felt was an extraordinarily apt symbol: Jefferson on horseback. Quoting from my submission documents, this is what I had to say by way of explanation: "No one knew better than Jefferson himself the complicated and degrading effects of the system of slavery, on master and slave alike. One can imagine that his bouts of migraine were exacerbated from repeated contemplation of this reality. At the same time, he could not have been the "Renaissance man" he was without slaves, for they enabled him to "extend his reach" toward simultaneous ambitions. Specifically, they gave him the skills and labor force to create the American temple of Monticello, among other accomplishments, and afforded him the leisure to write, study, entertain; in effect, to create a culture of scientific enlightenment, to equal the salons of Europe, in the "wilderness" of Virginia. Indeed, it is likely that the "ten able-bodied hands" gathered up by Edmund Bacon to assist Mr. Jefferson in the initial laying out of the University of Virginia were slaves. In light of all this, the depiction of Jefferson on horseback is an effective and complex symbol, for the horse, like the slave, is bred and trained for the rider's purposes, and it is to the rider that the horse on command bequeaths its power, speed, and endurance. An equestrian statue of Mr. Jefferson is thus a recognition of the system of slavery of which he was a part, and an acknowledgement of the debt owed to slaves for their part in building the legacy of Thomas Jefferson."
 
About two weeks before submission documents were due, I decided to sculpt a lifesize portrait bust. I ran out of time on this, yet once launched on the project resolved to carry through to the finish, regardless. The project proved unexpectedly difficult, and it was not until I understood the problem I was facing, that I was able to create the portrait I was hoping for. Namely, I began by working from contemporary painted and sculpted portraits of Jefferson as an older man, only to realize that this produced a portrait of a man few of us would recognize. The resolution of the problem came about when I began working instead from the image of Jefferson as a much younger man, and for this I chose the marble portrait bust by Jean Antoine Houdon (replicated in profile on the nickel, and certainly influential in the portrait on Mount Rushmore). Working from this bust as my primary model, and aging its appearance by reference to the portraits of an older Jefferson, I at last succeeded in producing an older, but recognizable Thomas Jefferson.
 
An invaluable resource for me, in terms of providing contemporary, first-person accounts of Thomas Jefferson, was a book entitled, Jefferson at Monticello, interviews with Edmund Bacon, Jefferson's overseer for many years, and Isaac, one of Jefferson's slaves. In addition to the interviews, the book cover showed a black-and-white photograph of each man, so that once having completed a portrait bust of Jefferson, I decided to balance this with a sculpted portrait of Isaac. This portrait likewise proved to be challenging. Because of the poor quality of the photograph, I had to rely upon considerable "interpretation."

PRICE:
Limited Edition #1 of 12. True Bronze mounted on polished
stone base. $10,000.

<< PREV | PORTRAITS | NEXT >>