TitleWilliam Henry Seward
Daten.d.
MediumPlaster (relief)
DimensionsOverall: 22 × 18 × 4 in.
Credit LineNational Academy of Design, New York, NY
Object number96-S
Label TextThis high-relief oval portrait shows Seward in profile, facing to the viewer's left. He wears a jacket and loose tie with shirt collar turned up. This was Robinson's best known work and a number of plaster replicas of it were evidently sold both in this country and abroad. Col. T. J. Kennedy stated that Robinson also modeled a marble bust of Seward. Both of these works were reportedly well-received by the Seward family who thought the relief to be "an excellent likeness" and the bust to be "superior to all others." Though there is no evidence to prove it, Robinson was probably aware of the work of Auburn's most famous sculptor of the day, Erastus Dow Palmer, and the Seward relief bears a close resemblance to Palmer's portraits done in the same manner.Seward (1801-1872) had begun his law practice in Auburn in the 1820s and returned there often during his years of public service in Washington. Robinson probably modeled his portraits of the statesman in Auburn in the late 1860s, after the Civil War and therefore after the busiest period of Seward's life, a time when he served as Lincoln's secretary of state.
It is not known when or under what circumstances this work entered the Academy's collection. It was recorded for the first time in the 1911 inventory of the collection.
