Paul Evans, Forged Front Wall Mounted Console, USA, 1970

Forged-Front Hanging Console by Paul Evans. USA, 1970. A rare wall-hung forged sculpture front console of highly desirable two-door, 60 inch scale. These forged front consoles were designed and built out of welded steel with forged three-dimensional elements in the Evan’s New Hope, PA workshop specifically as custom commissions. They are considered to be the most successful and most highly sought after pieces from the Evans studio.

This console is signed in welded script “PAUL EVANS 70 D Cool” – the added names are Dorsey Reading, who most likely built the case and forged elements, and Robert “Cool” Thomas Sr., the studio assistant who most likely painted the front. Cool was known to have developed with Evans’ a rich and subdued palette for these pieces based on the local New Hope landscape. Cool had been studio assistant to Pennsylvania Impressionist Edward W. Redfield until meeting Paul Evans. He worked in the Evans Studio, bringing his deft sense of color and technique to the finishes of many of the studio works. Cool left the Studio in 1970 making this one of the last pieces he worked on.

See documentary “Paul Evans: Crossing Boundaries & Crafting Modernism” for Michener/Cranbrook Museums, 2015.

The console features a complex arrangement of pictographic sculptural elements in grid work frames, the sculptural elements are covered in an autumnal polychrome palette of deep red, pale-blue, off-white and yellow with gold leaf, braised brass and black patinated accents. The top is the original Pennsylvania black slate, the underling wood case is covered in a patchwork of deep brown and black painted and oxidized steel. The case sides and center are wrapped in heavy steel straps with bolts and large hinges holding the doors.

Dimensions: 23h x 60w x 25d in