About the artist:

Samuel Thal was active/lived in Massachusetts. Samuel Thal is known for genre-figure, landscape, etching. Although primarily known for his drypoint etchings, Sam Thal was also an accomplished painter, illustrator, architectural sculptor and art educator. Born of Russian immigrant parents in New York City in 1903, Thal spent his childhood in Hadlyme, Connecticut, where his parents owned a large farm and poultry processing plant. When his family returned to New York City, he began his art studies with three years of drawing classes at the National Academy of Design (beginning at age twelve), three years of sculpture classes at the Beaux Arts Academy and two years of study at the Art Students League.

At age twenty, Thal and his family relocated to Boston where he remained for the balance of his life. There, he studied for three years (1923-26) at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts and spent the next ten years producing architectural sculpture in association with George K. Loeser at Harvard University.

By the mid-Thirties, the artist was able to devote all of his time to painting, sculpting and etching. Later in the decade, he assisted in the establishment of art education programs under the aegis of the Federal Art Project. Thal also taught life drawing classes at Garland Junior College in Boston, the Boston Architectural Club and the Boston Museum of Modern Art (now the Institute of Contemporary Art).

Thal’s drypoint etchings are well represented in numerous public and private collections including the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Metropolitan Museum, Library of Congress, Carnegie Institute of Art, Bibliotheque Nationale (Paris), Penn State University, Boston Public Library and Harvard Medical School. In 1942, he was awarded the coveted Talcott Prize by the Society of American Etchers; he was also the recipient of several purchase prizes from the Library of Congress. Thal’s one-man exhibition credits include Doll & Richards Gallery (1942, 1945 and 1957), Grace Horne Gallery (Boston, 1944) and the U.S. National Museum (part of the Smithsonian) in 1947.