Le Marteleur

Le Marteleur (French: [lə maʁt.lœʁ]; variously translated as The Hammerman or The Drop Forger) is a bronze sculpture by Belgian sculptor Constantin Meunier.

It depicts a hammerman holding a pair of pincers and wearing an apron, cap, and spats.

Created in 1886, several casts of the statue exist, including one on the campus of Columbia University.

Inspired by the "plastic grandeur of the industrial worker," Meunier's work reflected the political and economic developments of his day in his depiction of the hammerer: while the realism of the statue indicated the difficulty of the worker's labor, the contrapposto posture of its subject, borrowed from Classical and Renaissance sculpture, idealized and elevated him.

[1] The plaster cast of the statue was exhibited at the Parisian Salon 1886, where it earned an honorable mention.