Henry Inman (painter)

Henry Inman
File:Henry Inman MET ap93.19.1.jpg Painting of Inman by Jacob Hart Lazarus, circa 1837–1840, Metropolitan Museum of Art
Born	(1801-10-20)October 20, 1801 Utica, New York
Died	Manhattan, New York
Spouse(s)	Jane Riker O'Brien (m. 1822; his death 1846)
Children	John O'Brien Inman Henry Inman, Jr.
Signature
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Henry Inman (October 20, 1801 – January 17, 1846) was an American portrait, genre, and landscape painter.

Early life

He was born at Utica, N.Y. to English immigrant parents who were among the first settlers of Utica. His family moved to New York City in 1812.

Beginning in 1814 and continuing for the next seven years, he was an apprentice pupil of John Wesley Jarvis in New York City, along with John Quidor.

Career

He was the first vice president of the National Academy of Design. He excelled in portrait painting, but was less careful in genre pictures. Among his landscapes are Rydal Falls, England, October Afternoon, and Ruins of Brambletye. His genre subjects include Rip Van Winkle, The News Boy, and Boyhood of Washington. His portraits include those of Henry Rutgers and Fitz-Greene Halleck in the New York Historical Society. He also painted portraits of Angelica Singleton Van Buren, Bishop White, Chief Justices Marshall and Nelson, Jacob Barker, William Wirt, Audubon, DeWitt Clinton, Richard Varick, Martin Van Buren, Francis L. Hawks, and William H. Seward.

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  William Henry Seward around 1844

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  Seward's wife Frances Adeline Seward

Thomas L. McKenney assigned Inman, who was an accomplished lithographer, the task of copying more than a hundred oil paintings of Native American leaders by Charles Bird King to translate into a printed book, the History of the Indian Tribes of North America. The oil paintings are now in the collections of White House, the Joslyn Art Museum, and the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, among others. In the Metropolitan Museum, New York, are his Martin Van Buren, The Young Fisherman, and William C. Maccready as William Tell.

During a year spent in England in 1844–1845, he painted Wordsworth, Macaulay, John Chambers, Sir William Stewart, Baronet of Blair and other celebrities.

At the time of his death, he was engaged on a series of historical pictures for the Capitol at Washington. He was also president of National Academy of Design.

Among his pupils was the portraitist and still life painter Thomas Wightman.

Personal life

In 1822, Inman was married to Jane Riker O'Brien (1796–1873). Together, they were the parents of:

• Mary Lawrence Inman (1826–1860), who married Smith Cutter Coddington (1812–1868) in 1844.
• John O'Brien Inman (1828–1896), who was also a painter.
• Mary Lucy Inman (1828–1907), who married William Vail (1815–1880)
• Henry Inman, Jr. (1837–1899), a writer who married Eunice Churchill Dyer (1842–1922) in 1862.

Inman died on January 17, 1846 after returning from England to America due to failing health.

Selected works

• Paintings by Henry Inman
• Portrait of David Vanon by Henry Inman, 1832-1833.jpg

  Portrait of David Vanon (c. 1832–33)

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  Portrait of Angelica Singleton Van Buren (c. 1842), White House Collection

• Henry Inman - Sequoyah - Google Art Project.jpg

  Portrait of Sequoyah (c. 1830), National Portrait Gallery (United States)

• Inman, Henry - Portrait of Clara Fisher - Google Art Project.jpg

  Portrait of Clara Fisher (c. 1828), Indianapolis Museum of Art

• Brooklyn Museum - Portrait of a Woman - Henry Inman - overall.jpg

  Portrait of a Woman (c. 1825), Brooklyn Museum

• Henry Inman - No-Tin (Wind) - Google Art Project.jpg

  Portrait of No-Tin (Wind) (c. 1832–33), Los Angeles County Museum of Art

• Cornelia Rutgers Livingston by Henry Inman, detail, c. 1833, oil on canvas - New Britain Museum of American Art - DSC09423.JPG

  Portrait of Cornelia Rutgers Livingston (c. 1833), New Britain Museum of American Art

• Mrs. William Samuel Johnson.jpg

  Portrait of Mrs. William Samuel Johnson (c. 1823), Yale University Art Gallery

• Dismissal of School on an October Afternoon SC175338.jpg

  Dismissal of School on an October Afternoon (1845), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: 

External links

• Art and the empire city: New York, 1825–1861, an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Inman (see index)
• Gallery of Henry Inman's works, Art Authority
• Henry Inman collection at the New-York Historical Society