Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 12

Virgil Rainer
“Adam and Eve”

1926

About the Item

Very rare Art Deco three dimensional terracotta sculpture of Adam and Eve by the Austrian artist, Virgil Rainer. Hand painted by the artist. Signed bottom right and dated 1926. Condition is very good. Surface wear on some high points consistent with age. The sculpture has a terracotta outer surface shell with the verso being reinforced by a plaster and fiber mix. Italian green solid marble base 28 inches length by 4 wide by 2 inches high. This piece is meant to be hung; most likely above table or sideboard. The marble base is separate from base and would sit on surface underneath the hung artwork. Overall height with base would be 34.25 inches. Virgil Rainer was born as a farmer's son on the Messnerhof in the Ganz fraction of the municipality of Matrei in East Tyrol. He attended the State Trade School in Innsbruck until 1894, later the Royal School of Applied Arts Munich. From 1903 to 1910 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna with Hans Bitterlich and Edmund Hellmer. In 1912 he opened a studio in Vienna and later in Berlin. When the First World War broke out in 1914, he returned to Tyrol and served with the Kaiserjäger hunters. In the economically unfavorable period after World War I, he went to America and lived in Chicago and Milwaukee from 1921 to 1925. There he created, among many other works, one of his most monumental works, the statue of Christopher Columbus for the University of Chicago. From 1926 until his death he was based in Innsbruck. Rainer mainly created large-scale religious sculptures in a naturalistic style influenced by the Secession.
  • Creator:
    Virgil Rainer (1871 - 1948)
  • Creation Year:
    1926
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 32.25 in (81.92 cm)Width: 24.25 in (61.6 cm)Depth: 1.75 in (4.45 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Southampton, NY
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU1417145852
More From This SellerView All
  • “Mother and Children”
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Mid century modern original terracotta sculpture by the Hungarian artist, Anna Berkovits of a young woman with her two children. Circa 1955. Signed in the inside of the base. Condition is excellent. Parts of the sculpture have been deliberately not been glazed by the artist. Her work rarely becomes available. Provenance: Sarasota, Florida estate. Anna Berkovits was born in Hungary in 1911 and lived and worked in Budapest. She trained under the art teacher Almos Jaschik in Budapest. Later she was trained in ceramics by the artist Gador Istvan...
    Category

    1950s Modern Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Terracotta

  • “The Archer”
    By Pierre Le Faguays
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Stunning, original Art Deco bronze of a male archer by the well known French sculptor, Pierre Le Faguays. Condition is very good. Verde green finish over bronze patina. Slight rubbed...
    Category

    1930s Art Deco Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Bronze

  • “Eden”
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Original hand cast bronze dual figure of a hollow dressed torso of a male and female representing Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The bronze sculpture is attributed to the American sculptor Judith Shea. This piece is a maquette for a life size bronze executed by this artist that is located in an outdoor space in Buffalo, New York. Both are titled “Eden” and were done in 1987. Condition is excellent. Unsigned. Label on the bottom of the thick pine base states the artist and title of the artwork. Provenance: A Long Island, New York collector. Judith Shea has been a notable presence in the New York art world since the 1970s. Trained as a designer at Parsons, she soon found the fashion industry too restrictive and abandoned it in favor of making art. For her first solo show, at The Clocktower in 1976, Shea made a work based on color theory, using transparent silks in a spectrum of colors, worn by a live model. Other early work referenced clothing and its construction, first as flat, minimalist pattern and later as molded draping over implied, absent figures. In the 1981 Whitney Biennial, Shea showed three simple forms that evoked iconic clothes of the 1950s and 60s—the overcoat and the simple sheath dress—which hung from the wall as if on hangers. Five related works were included in the Hirshhorn’s Directions 83 survey. All of these works evoke human presence, felt as absence, as if the clothes were placeholders for missing persons. Thinking about her earlier clothes-based works, Shea has said that she “was looking for characters, for personae, really, to occupy them. I used clothes as stand-ins for people.” With the support of NEA grants, Shea began to learn bronze casting, and she was able to also spend time in Paris studying the statuary of its parks and gardens. This research led to several hollow-figure compositions from the 1980s that were designed to be sited in public spaces, such as Eden (John Hancock Tower, Chicago), Shepherd’s Muse (Oliver Ranch), Shield (Sheldon Museum of Art), and Without Words (Walker Art Center). In the 1990s, after a residency at Chesterwood—the site of Daniel Chester French’s studio in Stockbridge—Shea began to use woodcarving to make monumental public sculpture. The first of these full-scale wooden figures were shown in 1992 at the Whitney Museum at Phillip Morris in New York. In 1994 her wooden equestrian statue The Other Monument, a monumental image of a black man on a black horse, was installed at Doris Freedman Plaza in New York, in the same plaza as the William Tecumseh Sherman...
    Category

    1980s Post-Modern Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Bronze

  • “Double Nought”
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Original aluminum with pierced symbols sculpture by the contemporary artist Gary Kephart. Titled “Double Nought”. Completed in 2020. Signed with the arti...
    Category

    2010s Contemporary Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Metal

  • "Female"
    By Michael Patterson
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Wonderful original granite sculpture by well known contemporary artist Michael Patterson. This work of the female form was completed in 2013. The sculpture is attached to a white m...
    Category

    21st Century and Contemporary American Modern Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Stone

  • “Diana”
    By Emmanuel Villanis
    Located in Southampton, NY
    Beautiful golden brown patina bronze of Diana, the goddess of the moon by the French sculptor, Emmanuel Villanis. Signed on her shoulder. Impressed foundry stamp on base, “Society de...
    Category

    1880s Academic Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Bronze

You May Also Like
  • Signed Bruno Innocenti Female Nude Sculpture Relief 20 century plaster wood
    By Bruno Innocenti
    Located in Florence, IT
    The bass-relief is made of plaster painted with the warm color tone of the earth in order to represent terracotta. The subject is a juvenile girl, as we can see by the tenderness and...
    Category

    Mid-20th Century Post-War Nude Sculptures

    Materials

    Terracotta, Plaster, Wood Panel

  • Large Art Nouveau Terracotta Bust Sculpture Goldscheider 19th
    Located in Gavere, BE
    Terracotta bust of a young girl, the color mimicking the shadow of bronze sculptures, a feature that established the fame of the Friederich Goldscheider ceramic manufactory in Vienna...
    Category

    1940s Art Nouveau Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Plaster, Terracotta

  • The Rudder, Terracotta, 1930s
    By Ugo Cipriani
    Located in Saint Amans des cots, FR
    French Art Deco terracotta sculpture by Ugo Cipriani (1887-1960), France, 1930s. A man operating a rudder. Measurements : Width : 31"(79cm), Height : 16.7"(42.5cm), Depth : 8.7"(22cm...
    Category

    1930s Art Deco Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Terracotta

  • Large George Aarons Terracotta Sculpture Relief Art Deco Plaque WPA Artist
    By George Aarons
    Located in Surfside, FL
    Two Figures (Mother and son) 9" x 17" terracotta sculpture, signed lower left mounted to wood panel, 15 1/2" x 23 1/2" George Aarons (born Gregory Podubisky, in St. Petersburg, Russ...
    Category

    20th Century Art Deco Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Wood, Terracotta

  • Sculptured polychromed Male modelled Bust from artist workshop.
    Located in brussel, BE
    Gustave Fontaine (Etterbeek 1877-1952 Brussels) was a sculptor–painter. He took courses in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode and continued his training at the Academy of Brussels and with the sculptor Julien...
    Category

    20th Century Art Deco Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Plaster

  • Sculptured polychromed Female modelled Head from artist workshop.
    Located in brussel, BE
    Gustave Fontaine (Etterbeek 1877-1952 Brussels) was a sculptor–painter. He took courses in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode and continued his training at the Aca...
    Category

    20th Century Art Deco Figurative Sculptures

    Materials

    Plaster

Recently Viewed

View All