Happy Labor Day

Today and every day, I am grateful for people who work in ways that bless others. My gratitude includes all of you who work to bless your families.

Happy Labor Day!

As I prepared to write this post, I searched for Labor Day in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution. I found this 15 3/8-inch-tall statuette by Max Kalish.

The End of Day
by Max Kalish

Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Max Kalish

Artist Max Kalish was born in Valozin in 1891, a town that has experienced several challenges. In 1891 Valozin was in Lithuania. Before 1793 and and also between the Russian Revolution and World War II, the city was in Poland. Today it is in Belarus.

When Kalish was two years old, his Orthodox Jewish family moved to America. They settled in Cleveland Ohio. After studying art at the Cleveland School of Art, the National Academy of Design in New York City, and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France, Kalish returned to America. He worked on the architectural decorations of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco.

In 1916 Kalish joined the U.S. Army Medical Corps. He designed prosthetics for wounded soldiers and also created portrait figures of soldiers and officers. Between 1920 and 1937, he created about 60 statuettes of American laborers, especially steelworkers and riveters. He hoped that these statuettes would encourage optimism in Americans suffering through the Great Depression. About these he wrote:

“As I mingle among the workers in factories or in the open, I find them in their natural poses . . . while at rest there is a sense of rhythm and beauty that compares favorably with the great sculptural themes of the past.”