Horatio Greenough

Horatio Greenough (1805-1852), American sculptor, sometimes considered the country's first professional sculptor. He was born in Boston and educated at Harvard University. He executed busts of President John Quincy Adams, among others, and studied with the Danish Neo-Classical sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen in Italy, where he received a commission to sculpt figures for the American author James Fenimore Cooper. Greenough spent most of his life in Florence, executing portraits and groups in the Neo-Classical style. His huge, seated figure of President George Washington (1841, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.) was the first major commission given by the United States government to an American. The Rescue (1837-1851), representing the conflict between the Native Americans and the white settlers in America, decorates the portico of the Capitol in Washington.