The Sun – 1956 – The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Among Lippold’s artworks, ”The Sun” is his major creation. The sculpture, titled "Variation within a sphere #10: The Sun" was commissioned by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1953 and when unveiled in 1956 it created a sensation in the art world, consecrating Mr. Lippold as one of the most important artists of the 20th Century.

The artist spent three years in creating this geometric sculpture, measuring sixteen feet across and  eleven feet high, weaving a serious of nine intersecting disks and 14,000 welded joints of fine gold-plated wire.

This sculpture was the first commission ever given by The Metropolitan Museum to an artist.

"This is beautiful as you said", Prime Minister Nehru told the Metropolitan's director, James J. Rorimer, as they stood before Lippold’s Sun, during his official visit to the Museum.

In 1976 The Sun was lent to The Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C. for exhibition in its gallery devoted to "Artists Visions of Planetary Space". The Director of the Museum, Walter J. Boyne, called The Sun “unquestionably one of the masterpieces of Modern Art”.

Numerous newspapers and magazines reported on this spectacular sculpture, including The New York Times, Life, Time and L’Oeil.