Page 340 - The Legacy of Abraham Rothstein - text

Genre: modern

as a portrayal of a mindless type of individual, is not given an
unpleasant appearance.

60 Gold miner
Wood
19.5” x 8.75”

AR started with a large block of wood to carve this California
forty-niner, enabling him to create a figure with far greater
breadth and depth than the base from which it emerges. The
resulting sculpture appears—and is—unbalanced; AR could
have left a larger anchor for his carving, but he may have
become too accustomed to working with a small-diameter tree
limb to recognize the need for it in this case. The miner’s
upper body is emphasized, rather than his head: a laborer, not
an intellectual. He is standing in a stream, the front of the
square base chiseled to resemble running water. His trousers
are rolled up and he has no shirt—only a hat with a bent brim
to keep the sun out of his unshaven face. Held at a sluicing
angle in the miner’s apelike arms and hands, the pan is the
focus of attention, both of the miner and the viewer; its
diminutive size echoes the slight chances of finding a gold
nugget in it. AR, who came to California with hopes similar to
those of many immigrants during the Gold Rush, may have felt
a definite kinship with his subject.

78 Conductor
Wood
12.25” x 3”
Inscription: 56 (on base)

113 Conductor
Wood
13.5” x 5”

Despite AR’s dislike of music as a domestic pastime for people
whose time would be better spent in serious study, he retained
considerable respect for professional performers, such as those
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