Šiauliai has a new artistic highlight – a sculpture depicting the American one-cent coin in the courtyard of Vilnius University’s Šiauliai Academy (VUŠA). The coin has been in circulation since 1909 and was designed by Victor David Brenner (1871–1924), a native of Šiauliai.
The idea to commemorate the American one-cent coin in Lithuania’s fourth biggest town was conceived by industrial designer Vilius Puronas. He was looking through an interwar encyclopaedia and came across a story about Vytautas Baranauskas who designed the coin with a profile of Abraham Lincoln.
Baranauskas, originally from Šiauliai, is better known by his Americanised name, V. D. Brenner. “And so I wanted to pay tribute to my little Lithuania. I wanted to make this story better known, especially since it is connected to Šiauliai,” says Puronas.
The 1.45m bronze coin and the stainless steel C-shaped structure that holds it were designed eight years ago.
Puronas created the sculpture, entitled One Cent, together with the sculptor Vytautas Tallat-Kelpša. However, at the time another work won the competition announced by the City of Šiauliai and One Cent had to wait to be put on display.
Anniversary
The work, which entered the Lithuanian Book of Records as the largest replica of a coin, stood for a long time on the territory of one Šiauliai company. The sculpture finally found a place in the Library Courtyard of the VUŠA.
Renata Bilbokaitė, the director of the institution, says that the official unveiling has not yet taken place. This is expected to happen in February when the Cent Room on the second floor of the library celebrates its 10th anniversary.
The Cent Room was also conceived by Puronas and is a popular tourist attraction in Šiauliai. The walls and furniture of the room are covered with 157,130 different Lithuanian coins.
“The location of the sculpture One Cent was chosen so that it could be seen through the window of the Cent Room,” says Bilbokaitė.
Proposal by a US president
Born into a Jewish family, Brenner left his homeland at the age of 19. He studied art in the United States and later became known for his medals, bas-reliefs, and portraits.
The idea of using one of Brenner’s relief portraits for a coin design was suggested in 1908 by then US President Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919), who himself posed for a medal.
He saw the bas-relief of US President Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) hanging in the studio and suggested that it be transferred to the coin on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the politician’s birth.
Useful even on Mars
Brenner has created more than 120 works in his career, but the one-cent coin is by far his best-known design, even if few could name the author.
The coin was even flown to Mars in 2012. NASA scientists exploring the Red Planet used the coin to calibrate the lenses of the Curiosity rover’s cameras.
Puronas is an avid collector of one-cent American coins and has all the specimens minted over 115 years. He is planning to donate his collection to the Cent Room so that everyone can see the many iterations of the design by an artist from Šiauliai.
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