Elihu Vedder (1836-1923)

In 1881-1882, in an attempt to establish a steady income, Elihu Vedder entered into an arrangement with his friends John Low, Charles Caryl Coleman and the latter's brother Caryl Coleman to produce limited editions of decorative objects. One such piece was the present fireback, The Soul of the Sunflower. Based on his earlier drawing of 1868, the model was executed in iron by The Chelsea Tile Works.
Unfortunately, there are few records of the sales of these pieces, which included other firebacks with similarly mystical titles of Sun God and Japanese Dragon.