Hero of the Workshop, A.
An Early Female Sculptor
Thomas, Margaret. A Hero of the Workshop and a Somersetshire Worthy, Charles Summers, Sculptor. The story of his struggles & triumph. London…: Hamilton, Adams, & Co..., [1879].
8vo.; frontispiece photograph of Charles Summers with detached tissue-guard; title page printed in black and red; errata slip with one correction tipped-in at front; endpapers offset; blue cloth, decoratively stamped in black and gilt. In a specially made cloth slipcase.
First edition of a biography of Summers, written by one of his former female pupils. The errata slip corrects a line on page 34—“folds of their drapery” should read “folds of drapery.” Summers (1825-1878) was a sculptor from East Charlton, Somerset who rose to prominence at age 19 when a monument he created was noticed by artist Henry Weekes. Weekes brought Summers to his studio and formally trained him. In 1852, Summers moved to Melbourne, Australia, where he worked and taught until his death.
Margaret Thomas (1843-1929) was a poet, painter, and sculptor. Ten of her paintings were exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in the 1870s, and after studying under Charles Summers, she sculpted a bust of him which was displayed in the Shire Hall in Taunton, near Summers’s birthplace. In addition to A Hero of the Workshop, Thomas wrote seven other books, many of which she also illustrated. Her most lasting contribution was How to Understand Sculpture (1911) which is still considered an important work for apprentice sculptors.
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