Apostles at Last Supper by Arnold Friberg

Graphite on Paper

12 x 17 in.

This sketch for an unrealized painting shows Friberg’s playing with familiar figures and poses. Here Christ stands in a pose that resembles that used to show his wounds, similar to that adopted by Bertel Thorvaldsen in his Christus (1838). After the 1964 World’s Fair, where the Church had prominently featured a replica of the statue in the Mormon Pavilion, Friberg experimented with the pose in several subjects, including the first version of Christ’s Arrival in the Americas, conceived for his Book of Mormon Commission.