Artwork Details
- Title
- Thorfinn Karlsefni
- Artist
- Einar Jónsson (1874 – 1954)
- Year
- 1918; installed 1920
- Location
- Not on view
- Medium
- Bronze, on granite base
- Dimensions
- Height 7'4″, width 4'6", depth 4' (base height 5'7″, width 12', depth 12')
Artwork Description
A bequest by Ellen Phillips Samuel to Association for Public Art (then known as Fairmount Park Art Association) provided the funds for the Ellen Phillips Samuel Memorial. In the same spirit, her widowed husband, J. Bunford Samuel, commissioned a sculpture of the Icelandic hero, Thorfinn Karlsefni. Karlsefni was said to have visited America’s shores as early as 1004. However, little is known of him except what is recorded in the “Saga of Erik the Red.”
Samuel invited noted Icelandic artist, Einar Jónsson, to create the sculpture. He was brought to Philadelphia with his wife at the onset of World War I to work on this idealized portrait of the explorer. Einar Jónsson captured the Viking spirit, conveying how Thorfinn might have appeared since no known images exist. The statue was unveiled on November 20, 1920, near the site that was designated for the Samuel Memorial.
In 2018, the statue was toppled and pulled into the Schuylkill River by unknown vandals. Divers retrieved the sculpture, which sustained damage from the incident. It is currently being held in storage. In recent years, this bronze statue depicting Thorfinn Karlsefni had been used as a meeting place for the Keystone State Skinheads.
Content on this page was adapted from Public Art in Philadelphia by Penny Balkin Bach (Temple University Press, 1992). Bach was the longtime Executive Director of the Association for Public Art, working with the organization from 1980 to 2022.
Artwork Credits
Commissioned by Association for Public Art (formerly Fairmount Park Art Association) and J. Bunford Samuel
Owned by the City of Philadelphia