Carl Milles
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Carl Milles, born Carl Emil Wilhelm Andersson son of lieutenant Emil "Mille" Andersson and his wife Walborg Tisell, (June 23 1875–September 19 1955) was a Swedish sculptor, best known for his fountains. He was married to Olga Milles and brother to Ruth Milles.
Carl Milles has sculptured the Poseidon-statue in Gothenburg, the Gustaf Vasa-statue at the Nordiska museet, the Orfeus group outside the Stockholm Concert Hall and the Folke Filbyter-scupture in Linköping. The latter could be found on a stamp from 1975, celebrating that he would have become a hundred years old that year. Millesgården became his last home and is nowadays a museum.
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Milles in America
In 1931 American publisher George Booth brought Milles to his school, Cranbrook, in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan to serve as his sculptor in residence. Part of Booth's arrangement with his principle artists was that they were expected to create major commissions outside the Cranbrook environment. By the time Milles left America for the last time over twenty years later he had dotted the American landscape with his works.
Milles' fountain group "The Wedding of the Waters" in St. Louis, Missouri symbolizes the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers merging just upstream. Commissioned in 1936 and unveiled in May 1940 to a crowd of about 3000 people, the fountain caused a local uproar because of its playful, irreverent, naked, and nearly cartoonish figures, and because Milles had conceived the group as a wedding party with undeniable sexual overtones. Local officials insisted that the name be changed to "The Meeting of the Waters".
Selected American Works
- WWJ Building, Albert Kahn architect, Detroit, Michigan 1936
- Monument for Peace, Ramsey County Court House, Holabird & Root architects, St Paul, Minnesota, 1936
- Racine County Court House, Holabird & Root architects, Racine Wisconsin 1931
- Doors of Finance Building, Harrisburg Pennsylvania, 1938
- Meeting of the Waters, St Louis, Missouri 1936 – 1940
- On a Sunday Morning, Ann Arbor, Michigan 1941
- Numerous works at Cranbrook School, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, including Mermaids & Tritons Fountain, 1930, Sven Hedin on a Camel, 1932, Jonah and the Whale Fountain, 1932, Orpheus Fountain, 1936,
- Fountain of Faith, Falls Church, Virginia 1952
- Spirit of Transportation, Detroit Civic Center, Detroit Michigan 1952
- Volker Memorial Fountain, Kansas City, Missouri 1955
- Triton Blowing on a Shell, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota
Photo gallery
 Folke Filbyter searching for his lost grandson, statue by Carl Milles at Stora Torget, Linköping |
Sources and references
- Kvaran, Einar E., An Annoted Inventory of Outdoor Sculpture in Washtenaw County, Masters Thesis 1989
- Liden, Elisabeth, Between Water and Heaven, Carl Milles Search for American Commissions, Almqvist & Wiksell International, Stockholm, Sweden 1986
- Nawrocki, Dennis and Thomas Holleman, Art in Detroit Public Places, Wayne State University Press, Detroit, Michigan 1980
- Piland & Uguccioni, Fountains of Kansas City, City of Fountains Foundation 1985
- Rogers, Meyric, Carl Milles, An Interpretation of His Work, Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut 1940
- Taylor, Askew, Croze, et al, Milles At Cranbrook, Cranbrook Academy of Art, 1961
- Westbrook, Adele and Anne Yarowsky, Design in America, The Cranbrook Vision 1925 – 1950, Detroit Institutesv:Carl Milles
