In Memory of Theo Faiss

Uncommon card · No. 171409

In Memory of Theo Faiss (German: Im Gedenken an Theo Faiss) is the name of two related 1921 reliefs by the English sculptor Edith Maryon. A close associate of Anthroposophical Society leader Rudolf Steiner, Maryon made the work to commemorate the seven-year-old Theo Faiss, who was killed by an overturned horse-drawn wagon in 1914. Faiss had been well liked by the community in Dornach, Switzerland—the centre of Steiner's spiritual movement and the place where the Society was building the Goetheanum, a structure designed by Steiner, as its headquarters. In the years afterwards, Steiner frequently invoked Faiss's death, terming it a voluntary sacrifice that enveloped the Goetheanum with a protective spiritual sheath. Maryon made two versions of the relief; both were cast in plaster, and at least the second was also cast in bronze. Both versions are approximately two feet tall and one foot wide. The central motif in each shows a guardian angel figure cradling the spirit of Faiss in one arm...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Xue Li (photographer at the Goetheanum), Public domain