NEW YORK, NY.- In a ceremony at the SLC’s New York convention in October 2007, the bas-relief, representing Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, was presented by club vice president Brian Snyder to the club’s French representative, Laurent Ghesquière. And on October 31 a ceremony will be held in the city of Colmar at the office of the mayor of Colmar to present the Bartholdi bas-relief to both the city and the Bartholdi Museum. Scheduled to accept the gift is the Hon. Gilbert Meyer, mayor of Colmar.

Frederic A. Bartholdi was born in Colmar, and a museum of his life works is located inside his former residence there. Representing the Statue of Liberty Club will be Vincent Swift, SLC president; Snyder, SLC vice president; and French members of the club.

The bas-relief was sculpted depicting Bartholdi in the midst of creating a maquette of his chosen design for the ultimate work, which is officially entitled Liberty Enlightening the World, or, in French, La liberté éclairant le monde. After hundreds of hours of detailed handwork, the bas-relief was cast in bronze and mounted on 25-inch-by-20¼-inch French Carpathian elm burl and American walnut woods. That first, important cast is recorded as Artist Proof Bronze, Number 1.

Wiegand of St. Louis has sculptures on exhibit in both public and private collections around the world, including pieces created for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, which were presented to both presidents in Oval Office ceremonies at the White House. Among Wiegand’s other works are portraits of Mary Mother of the Church, in the collection of the Vatican; of Ernest Hemingway, exhibited at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum in Boston; and of Charles A. Lindbergh, at the Le Bourget airport landing site of the "Spirit of St. Louis" in Paris. In addition are two portrait sculptures of Christopher Columbus and other pieces, located in Spain. Also on exhibit—at Busch Stadium in St. Louis—is a portrait of August A. Busch Jr., president of Anheuser-Busch from 1946 to 1989. Onboard Burt Rutan’s Space Ship One, the stainless bas-reliefs of Lindbergh and the "Spirit of St. Louis" took flight to become the first official bas-relief sculptures in space.