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Thomas Wilson (born 1954) is a master metalsmith focused in classical ironwork, bronze and copper. In addition, he is an expert in drawing and illustration; is a sculptor, author, and an accomplished Blues musician.(1) Initially starting out forging authentic archaic hand tools, Wilson soon became closely connected to the daughter and legacy of Austrian master blacksmith Cyril Colnik(2) and developed his craftsmanship through firsthand detailed study of Colnik's Belle Époque masterworks and pieces. A highly distinguished international talent, Wilson has done restoration work globally, including for the White House, Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, the Petit Palais,(1) and complete restoration illustrations for Neues Schloss (Baden-Baden), to name a few.(3)(4) In 1974, he was part of the group which founded the Artist-Blacksmith's Association of North America. Wilson lives and works in Milwaukee, Chicago, and abroad --most recently in Peking where he taught metalwork and authored three books. He is a frequent visitor to Florence, Italy where he is usually found sketching and studying historic masterworks (and playing Blues), in his ongoing pursuit of the essence of craftsmanship of antiquity.(4)

Early life & Education
Growing up in the City of Chicago and the surrounding area, Tom Wilson's native talent was revealed in his earliest drawings and illustrations. Largely self-taught, by the age 16 he already had his own independent studio and began producing work for publication. His motivations and intrigue with metalwork began at the same time with examples of classic tool making and he soon built his own stone forge, largely from reference to Colonial era drawings and engravings. By age 18, Wilson was making diligent and nuanced pieces from his study of classical metalworking techniques such as repoussé and chasing. It was while studying under Alexander Weygers that Wilson also first met Gretchen Colnik, daughter of local Austrian émigré master blacksmith Cyril Colnik --of Chicago's  Columbian Exposition (1893-1894) renown. It was this fortuitous connection which focused Wilson's native talent (and further studies with Weygers) into intersection with the legacy and artifacts of a genuine Old World master craftsman.(2) Wilson describes his ensuing long friendship with local media celebrity Gretchen Colnik (from age 68 until her death at 88) as pivotal, for it brought him into firsthand contact with the wealth of ornamental ironwork artifacts of her father; and informed him of the seminal history surrounding both the Gilded Age and the master ironwork lauded at the  Chicago World's Fair and beyond. It is then accurate to say --through Gretchen Colnik, a profound path was introduced for Wilson to the earlier era of Cyril Colnik (b.1871-1958), and a door further opened to the rigorous Old World craftsmanship which had infused the education and life's work of the master Colnik himself.(4) (See: Colnik's XXX Guild Masterpiece)

Education

 * Alexander Weygers: From 1973 through the mid-1980s (a total of eight seasons) in Carmel Valley, California, Wilson was a student of Dutch émigré sculptor Alexander Weygers (1901-1989) in the areas of sculpture, Form theory, blacksmithing, forging, and toolmaking.(4)


 * Kyril Vassilev: From 1970-73, Wilson was a drawing student of Kyril Vassilev (1906-1987), renowned painter and court artist to King Boris II of Bulgaria.(4)

Career
Explain the subject's early life historically using a journalistic style.



WHAT ARE GOOD SUB-CATEGORIES UNDER CAREER???

"Thomas Wilson has been internationally recognized for his original creative talent and has, in all likelihood drawn more images of ironwork than anyone in the history of metalsmithing. With fluency in multiple classic Renaissance metalworking techniques, Wilson has worked on high-profile ironwork restorations and creations for sites including the White House, the Globe Theatre, and the Petit Palais. His work can be found worldwide, from public and private venues of North America to castles and streets of Europe to palaces in Asia and the Middle East. He is the artistic director and founder of World Metal Art Affiliates (WMAA ™craftsmanship in pursuit of antiquity) an atelier, forge, and foundry focused on classical ironwork, original commissions, commercial metalwork, and light structural steel. At the age of sixteen, Wilson built his first forge in River Hills, Wisconsin from a colonial American drawing. He relocated his ironwork design business to Beijing in 2007." --Sally Adams. 2016. (Thomas Wilson's Ironwork Notebooks - Inspiration From A Master)

An admirer and long scholar of Cyril Colnik (Austrian émigré and delegation member to the Columbian Exposition), Wilson is the foremost authority on his life, body of work, and legacy. In personal demonstration of deep study and recognition of the mastery of Colnik, Wilson can recreate in total from memory, Colnik's masterpiece required for matriculation from apprentice to master and guild membership. Colnik's masterwork features ??38?? individual iron working techniques and is the centerpiece of the Villa Terrace Collection: https://www.villaterrace.org/colnik_collection/

Major Commissions

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Blues musician
Among his many talents, Tom Wilson is also a "multi-faceted musician who has had the distinct pleasure of accompanying nearly every Blues performer to pass through the Milwaukee/Chicago music scene in the last thirty years."(8)

Awards & Recognition

 * 2019: "Thomas Wilson is a remarkable artist author and scholar working in the metal arts today. He is a LIVING AMERICAN TREASURE [sic] and one of the very few artists who are masters of the ancient traditions of ironworking in the 20th and 21st century." --Micheal W. Monroe, Director (former), Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC
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Influences: Colnik the Mozart of Metal, and the Chicago World's Fair 1893-1894
The progression of Tom Wilson's craftsmanship and refinement of technique is tied to the story and legacy of Cyril Colnik (b.1871-1958). Born in Styria, Austria Colnik is intimately connected to Chicago and the development of Milwaukee and its large Germanic population beginning in the period of the turn of the last century (1900). In the early 1890s, Cyril Colnik completed his apprenticeship and masterwork, a GRILLE OR FIREPLACE SCREEN??[citation] demonstrating all iron working techniques in a single composition. Unique to this work is a central figurative form of carved iron --a devilish, winged Gothic caricature of Colnik's most hated teacher. In achieving guild membership, Colnik was then selected at age 22 by his master, Reinhold Kirsch (Munich), for a position in the Austrian government's official delegation of artisans to the Chicago World's Fair of 1893-1894. The Fair, better known as the Columbian Exposition, heralded both the anniversary of Columbus' discovery of the New World and the dawn of all technology which would develop in the coming 20th century. While the American pavilions displayed the technologies of Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, Nicola Tesla, and George Westinghouse; the Austrian exhibits (#)[ ] showcased the richest examples of Franz Joseph I's (1848–1916) new era of grandeur, typified by the Belle Époque style in iron work and craftsmanship. The young Cyril Colnik was a bridge to tradition, yet chose to remain in Chicago and eventually moved north to Milwaukee. To the wealthy beer barons, tanners, bankers and society of Chicago and Milwaukee making new industries and building a new cities, Colnik was a coveted artisan of the Old World's refinement in their midst. From 1970-73, when Thomas Wilson was a student of Kyril Vassilev he met Gretchen Colnik, daughter of Cyril Colnik. From that point forward Wilson became an inheritor of a unique legacy and the confidant of Colnik --in Wilson, Gretchen Colnik could pass on the firsthand knowledge of her father's world and past. CITATION : https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/10.5325/jaustamerhist.1.2.0117.pdf

As summarized by specialist John-Duane Kingsley to the Decorative Arts Trust -- "Colnik was born to a privileged Austrian family before training to become a journeyman blacksmith and joining the workshop of Reinhold Kirsch in Munich, Germany. Through Kirsch’s workshop, Colnik created a masterpiece firescreen (figure 2) with which he earned the title of master blacksmith and the opportunity to emigrate to the U.S. where his work would be shown at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Today, his masterpiece is as iconic a piece to forging as the Mona Lisa is to painting. He has been called a Mozart of Metal, a true virtuoso at an early age."

From Chicago, Colnik was drawn to Milwaukee by the strong German population and the rapidly industrializing city where a prosperous economy provided opportunities for commissions. Colnik’s German patrons shared an appreciation for the naturalism of his design sensibility and wished to consciously incorporate elements of European style into their homes and cityscape. As a result, Colnik created works that now reside in the Captain Frederick Pabst Mansion, the Herman Uihlein Mansion, the Paula and Erwin Uihlein Mansion, Mader’s German Restaurant, Von Trier German Tavern, and the Gallun and Kalvelage Mansions." CITATION (https://decorativeartstrust.org/colnik-article/)

Published works by Thomas Wilson
PUBLISHED WORKS vs. REFERENCES vs. BIBLIOGRAPHY


 * "The Adventures of Anvil Boy", (first in a new series) copyright © 2021 Thomas Wilson (author and illustrator); with Sally Adam; ISBN 978-0-578-94680-1; independently published


 * "The Ironwork of Cyril Colnik - Milwaukee's World-Class Master of Wrought Iron", copyright © 2011 by Thomas Wilson, with forward by H. Russell Zimmermann (author, historian, architect); ISBN 978-0-615-45865-6; Phoenix on Fire Publishing Company.


 * "Cyril Colnik's Ornamental Iron Shop Catalogue - (Selected and Compiled by Thomas Wilson)", copyright © 2011 by Thomas Wilson, with forward by Bruce Precourt (Senior Lecturer, Classics Dept. University of Wisconsin); independently published.