Believing in America

The stars aligned for a group of artists and artisans to pay proper homage to the Declaration of Independence

WRITTEN BY ANNIE WU

Back in 1992, artist José-María Cundín, originally from the Basque Country, Spain, released a hand-engraved facsimile of the United States Declaration of Independence, after three years of hard work and collaboration with craftsmen from his homeland—a papermaker and a renowned metal engraver. But the project didn’t draw broader interest from the American public.

Sara Fattori, who owned a fine art gallery in Palm Beach, Florida, before starting her interior design business, knew of Cundín’s work, but it wasn’t until her father’s passing, around 2007, that she pondered more deeply the meaning of the country’s founding document and the possibility of promoting Cundín’s hand-engraved version. Her father had fought in World War II and was part of an aviation force in the Normandy invasion. “The reality of war,” she said, and the sac-

rifices made by previous generations to preserve freedom, moved her.

The Perfect Frame

Around 2014, when an opportunity arose to donate a Cundín engraving for an auction event benefiting the Carson Scholars Fund’s initiative to promote literacy in low-income neighborhoods, Fattori began searching for a frame worthy of encasing the document. While researching online, she discovered Marcelo Bavaro, a fourth-generation historical frame maker based in New York, whose Italian family inherited a century of craftsmanship in carpentry and gilding. Fattori instinctively knew he was the right fit.

When they met, Bavaro said the Declaration should be encased in a Federal-style frame befitting the time period when the original document was drafted—the

CLOCKWISE FROM

LEFT The brass plate etched with the Declaration; engraver Pedro Aspiazu; and artist José-María Cundín with the printed Declaration.

Courtesy of José-María Cundín & Fattori Fine Frames newly formed country wanted to distinguish itself from its former ruler, so a style emphasizing simple, clean lines was popularized, contrasting sharply with ornate British detailing. “I knew I was with the right person when Marcelo said, ‘Oh, it should be in a Federal-style frame,’” Fattori said during a recent interview at Bavaro’s Brooklyn firm Quebracho Inc., which restores and makes frames for top museums, art galleries, and auction houses.

Bavaro was intrigued by the project: “I always wondered how this country was guided by this piece of paper for centuries. And everybody respects it. I come from a country where nobody respects anything.” He was referring to Argentina—his family emigrated there in the early 20th century. In the early 1980s, when Argentina was under military rule, Bavaro himself was caught in the political turmoil and jailed for writing articles that criticized the government. Due to his family’s influence, he managed to escape and was on the run for five days before crossing the Brazilian border and taking a plane to the United States, where he met up with his father, the first of his family to settle here.

Federal-style frames require incredible carpentry skills; an artisan must shape the wood into a narrow concave shape. There are few workshops left in the world that are still engaged in this artwork. “Craftsmanship is something that is dying out,” Bavaro said. “It’s so simple to make money sitting in front of a computer; why are you going to break your hands doing what we do?”

While working on the Declaration project in 2014, Bavaro, together with Fattori and her husband, Paul, joined forces to launch a new company, Fattori Fine Frames, that would provide custom-made, handcrafted frames for people looking to frame artwork and mirrors in their homes.

The auction event that took place the following year was a success, with a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution buying the framed document.

History

Cundín’s facsimile is a copy of William J. Stone’s engraving—the latter was commissioned by then-Secretary of State John Quincy Adams during the 1820s as an official government copy, because Adams had grown concerned over the fragile condition of the original Declaration. In Stone’s tradition, Cundín set out to make a hand-engraved brass plate—it would be the first such engraving since Stone’s time.

Cundín always had a personal connection to America, even before becoming a citizen in 1971. His father was born on July 4 and frequently joked about how his birthday coincided with that of America’s. Cundín was moved by the content of the Declaration upon reading it in its entirety. “The demand for freedom—that is the connection that I found most touching in my heart,” he said in a recent phone interview.

When he began the engraving project in 1989, out of curiosity he started researching the founding fathers who signed the document. Cundín found out that John Adams had visited the Basque Country in 1780, and had been so inspired by the local governance system that he kept it in mind while drafting the United States Constitution years later. Adams also wrote about the “Biscay” government in his treatise, “A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America,” stating, “While their neighbors have long since resigned all their pretensions into the hands of kings and priests, this extraordinary people have preserved their ancient language, genius, laws, government, and manners ... their love of liberty, and unconquerable aversion to a foreign servitude.”

The connection with Cundín’s homeland convinced him to look for artisans there for the engraving project. Pedro Aspiazu, who was born into a multi-generational family of engravers, hand-chiseled the plate, while a Basque company handmade the paper from pure cotton, and a Madrid company did the printing.

Cundín retained the same paper size as the original, but reduced the text size so there would be empty space—“a visual environment, to make it ... a document that everybody could receive in the mail, but in a magnificent size,” he said. The framed engraving resembles a painting, yet is humble in its quiet dignity. Cundín’s team made 1,200 copies— the first few were gifted to George H.W. Bush during his presidency, the king of Spain, and the United States Congress. Today, there are about 1,000 copies still available for purchase.

Independence Day

Paul Fattori hopes that younger generations can truly appreciate what this document means and the extent to which the signees risked their lives to publicly protest the British monarchy. “It symbolizes all that freedom, that liberty—and it’s about the people, ... consent of the people,” he said.

Sara Fattori hopes Americans neither take their freedoms for granted nor forget about the balance of powers in government. “I’m looking at a country like a family unit; like, if someone is too powerful and controlling, then the other people are not going to thrive ... and be able to flourish as a human being,” she said.

Fourth of July

The first $2 note...

was issued on June 25, 1776, making it nine days older than America. The Continental Congress authorized these “bills of credit” for the defense of America. Today’s version—launched on the United States Bicentennial in 1976, after a decade-long hiatus of the bill’s printing— depicts on the reverse an engraving of John Trumbull's "Declaration of Independence" (only 42 men appear in the $2 version, rather than the original painting’s 47).

LOCAL TRADITIONS

Bristol, Rhode Island...

is home to the nation’s longest-running tradition of celebrating Independence Day—the city celebrated the very first anniversary in 1785 with the firing of 13 cannons in the morning and 13 guns in the evening—founded by Reverend Henry Wight, a veteran of the Revolutionary War. Festivities in Bristol each year typically kick off long before the Fourth, starting on Flag Day, June 14, with outdoor concerts and races, block parties, a vintage baseball game, a carnival, and a Fourth of July Ball, leading up to the main event—the Fourth of July Parade (officially the Military, Civic, and Firemen’s Parade). It’s no wonder the town calls itself “America’s most patriotic town.”

Cody, Wyoming...

holds its annual Cody Stampede celebration for the Fourth of July over several days as well, this year beginning on July 1 with the rodeo it’s known for, followed by concerts and parades, and culminating in fireworks at dusk on the Fourth. Cody is 52 miles from Yellowstone National Park, and prides itself on capturing the spirit and heritage of the Wild West—after all, it was founded by Colonel William F. “Buffalo Bill” Cody in 1896.

Gatlinburg, Tennessee...

has a full day of Independence Day celebration, beginning one minute after midnight with a parade, making it the “earliest” celebration in the nation each year. The day’s events include the Gatlinburg River Raft Regatta, where contestants enter one of two categories, either “Trash” (rafts not handmade) or “Treasure” (with handmade rafts)—anything goes, and you can even send a rubber ducky down the river. Festivities are capped off with a Fireworks Finale downtown. This mountain resort town lies right outside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and for centuries saw Cherokee, European, and early American hunters and fur trappers along the hunting trail before officially becoming a town.

Chicago...

is not unique in putting on a fireworks show, but the city boasts miles of lakefront high-rise windows, rooftops, balconies, beaches, and boats from which to view the fireworks. Navy Pier is an attraction unto itself, jutting 3,040 feet into lake Michigan—the fireworks displays launched from it create stunning reflections upon the nighttime waters below. It also boasts an innovative and unique, $22.5-million, 196-foot-tall Ferris wheel featuring 42 climate-controlled gondolas. Navy Pier hosts fireworks shows on Wednesday and Saturday nights throughout the summer from Memorial Day through Labor Day, but they save the biggest and best for Independence Day. —JUDITH MCCONNELL

Why fireworks?

The first Fourth of July anniversary celebrated was in 1777 in Philadelphia. Founding Father John Adams’s wish that Independence Day be celebrated with pomp and circumstance— “with shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other from this time forward, forevermore”—came to pass. He was referring to July 2, the date when delegates from 12 colonies voted for independence, but July 4 is when the Declaration of Independence was officially adopted, and what would become Independence Day.