Steffen Thomas (1906-1990) German/American, Expressionist Lithograph. Black and white hand printed figural scene, depicting a kneeling figure on the shore of a river, with a heavily stylized sun in the sky. Titled in pencil bottom left: "Sunworshippers." Inscribed in pencil bottom middle: "Line Black Handprint." Signed in pencil bottom right. Framed.

Overall Size: 13 x 15 1/2 in. 

Sight Size: 8 3/4 x 11 in. 

Steffen Wolfgang George Thomas was born in Fürth, Germany on January 7th, 1906. He expressed a strong passion for art from an early age, and was caught at the age of eight carving angel faces in the marble foundation of his home. His father delighted rather than furious, apprenticed Thomas to a local stone carver, after which he was accepted to the School of Applied Arts, Nuremberg, and then to the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich. His focus was drawing and sculpture based on the classical model. Thomas achieved “Master” status at age twenty-one and was given his own studio, but he became enamored with the culture and scenery of the United States and decided to immigrate there in 1928. He spent brief periods in Florida, Illinois, and Alabama, but soon settled in Atlanta, Georgia, where he spent much of the rest of his life. In 1931 Thomas created a bust of journalist Henry W. Grady which became the central display of the Georgia Newspaper Hall of Fame and led him to a long career creating public monuments. He married his neighbor, a schoolteacher named Sara Douglass, in 1933. After a brief trip to Germany with her to visit his family, he returned to America for good after clashing with them over Adolf Hitler’s rise to power, and renounced his German citizenship in 1935, becoming an American citizen. He served as Arts Supervisor for the National Youth Administration (WPA program) from 1939 to 1941, served as a representative of the Georgia Artists Association with the Georgia Art Commission in the 1950s, and on the advisory board of UNICEF in the 1960s. In 1941 he and Sara purchased fifty acres near Stone Mountain, Georgia, and subsequently built a home and artist studio there where they raised four children. Thomas explored painting and printmaking, heavily influenced by Romanticism, with many of his subjects inspired by the female form. In his later years he was more and more drawn to Expressionism and was relatively successful for most of his working life, primarily supporting his family through commissions, both in sculpture and in portraiture. He also continually worked on the studio complex by hand, inadvertently turning it into a tourist destination over the years. Thomas created numerous busts commemorating prominent Georgians, including Chief Justice Richard Russell Jr. and Martha Berry, as well as portrait heads of Franklin D. Roosevelt, George Washington Carver, and other historical figures. However, after spending twenty years trying to craft a proposal for the Stone Mountain Civil War Memorial that ended in a schism between him and the community, he became disenchanted with seeking public commissions and turned to create more personal, introspective works. Thomas always displayed an inability to take criticism, which damaged his reputation in his later years, alienating him from many gallery owners, collectors, and patrons. In 1970 Thomas sold the Stone Mountain estate and returned to Atlanta, living and working in a midtown home studio the rest of his life. In the 1980s he became withdrawn from society, focusing more on poetry and studies of philosophy, religion, and mythology. He continued to create art despite his failing sight and health, producing watercolors, encaustics, mosaics, and even welded copper abstract sculptures, and over his life he was awarded numerous honors by Atlanta, with his pieces on permanent display at the High Museum of Art, the Georgia Capitol Museum, and the Museum of Arts and Sciences in Macon. He died on January 27th, 1990, and his wife founded the Steffen Thomas Museum and Archives in Buckland in 1997, dedicated to providing art education programs for children in rural Georgia.