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Ernest Trova

American artist (1927-2009)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 19, 2026
Entity authorityQ828350
Source-derived summary

Ernest Tino Trova (February 19, 1927 – March 8, 2009) was a self-trained American surrealist and pop art painter and sculptor. Best known for his signature image and figure series, The Falling Man, Trova considered his entire output a single "work in progress." Trova used classic American comic character toys in some of his pieces because he admired their surrealism. Many of Trova's sculptures are cast in unusual white bronze. He began as a painter, progressing through three-dimensional constructions to his mature medium, sculpture. Trova's gift of forty of his works led to the opening of St. Louis County, Missouri's Laumeier Sculpture Park.

Biography

Trova was born on February 19, 1927, in Clayton, Missouri, where he attended Clayton High School and St. Louis University High School. His father, an industrial tool designer and inventor, died shortly after Trova graduated from high school.

His interest in poetry led him to begin a correspondence with Ezra Pound, who had been confined to St.

Editorial summary

“Ernest Trova” enters the record as american artist (1927-2009). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Ernest, Trova and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1927, 2009—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1927-02-19. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Ernest, Trova and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Ernest Trova” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Ernest, Trova and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q828350. VIAF identifies the subject as 79411519. The Library of Congress control number is n50011758. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1927 and 2009.

Critical limits

Public reputation and documentary evidence do not always develop together; absence from a summary is not evidence of historical absence. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Ernest Trova”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Ernest Trova primary sources, Ernest Trova archive and Ernest research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Ernest Trova”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Ernest Trova” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.