William Henry Seward

Artist Chauncey Bradley Ives (American, 1810-1894)

Date1857

DimensionsH (without base): 24 1/2 in. (62.2 cm)

MediumMarble

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Roy Rike

Object number

1964.56

Not on View

Label TextFormer Governor of New York William Henry Seward (1801-1872) was a U.S. Senator at the time Chauncey Bradley Ives sculpted this likeness. Seward went on to become Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of State (after losing the Republican presidential nomination to Lincoln). He retained this position under Andrew Johnson. Ives was one of several sculptors who formed a colony of American artists in Rome. He depicts Seward in the classical tradition of the heroic nude, as if he were a Roman emperor.Published ReferencesRiefstahl, Rudolph M., "What is Conservation," Toledo Museum News, New Series, vol. 8, no. 3, Autumn 1965, pp. 51-67, repr. p. 63, (Also published as handbook), detail of cleaning p. 70.Exhibition HistoryToledo Museum of Art, Treasures for Toledo, Dec. 1964-Jan. 1965.Comparative ReferencesSee also New York Historical Society, Catalogue of American Portraits in the New York Historical Society, 1941, no. 681, p. 278. (Reproduces Ives' plaster bust of Seward signed and dated 1857, H. 29 1/2 inches.) Cf. Tuckerman, H. T., Book of the Artists, New York, 1882, p. 583. Cf. Taft, Lorado, History of American Sculpture, New York, 1903, pp. 112-113.