Tompkins H. Matteson (1813-1884)
A Sculptor's Studio
Oil on canvas, 1857
AIHA Collection: Gift of Walter Launt Palmer

The studio interior is a comparatively rare genre which gained relative popularity in America during the mid-19th century, and most of those works were historically retrospective. A Sculptor's Studio is doubly rare: a contemporary scene in the studio of a sculptor, rather than a painter.

Tompkins Matteson, one of the most noted painters in upstate New York during the 1850s, was well-known for genre and historical subjects. This painting depicts the studio interior of Albany's celebrated sculptor, Erastus Dow Palmer (1817-1904). During the mid-19th century, Palmer's studio was a focal point of Albany's artistic community and a source of information for visiting artists. Depicted in this painting are Palmer's assistants, Launt Thompson in black, Charles Calverley, and probably Richard Park, all of whom were noted 19th century Albany sculptors.

Ariaantie Coeymans Verplanck

by Nehemia Partridge

A Sculptor's Studio

by Tompkins H. Matteson

The Fondey Family

by Ezra Ames

Still Life: Fruit in a Classical Setting

by John Vanderlyn, Jr.

The Fist

by Alice Morgan Wright

Margin of Silence

by Kay Sage

Thoroughbreds

by Walter L. Greene

Bust of Young Girl

by Charles Calverley

Library at Arbor Hill (Olcott Interior)

by Walter Launt Palmer

Emma Turner Banks

by Charles Loring Elliot