Joanna Quiner

Joanna Quiner (August 27, 1796 – September 20, 1868) was an American seamstress and self-taught sculptor.

Portrait of Quiner by James Frothingham

Early life

Quiner was born in Beverly, Massachusetts, the daughter of Abraham Quiner, Jr. and Susannah Camell.^[1]

Career

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Sculpture of Robert Rantoul at the Boston Athenæum

For much of her early life, Quiner worked as a seamstress in her hometown of Beverly and nearby Salem; she did some upholstery for the family of Theodore Parker, and came to admire Parker's views. In 1838, she took a position in the household of Seth Bass, the librarian at the Boston Athenæum. She lived in the Athenaeum building with the Bass family; sculptor Shobal Vail Clevenger kept studio space there, and she observed him at work. She borrowed some of Clevenger's clay and crafted a likeness of Seth Bass that was of such quality that he encouraged her to continue her art. She was forty-two at the time. Quiner exhibited work at the Athenaeum in 1846–48, and in 1847 worked there briefly as a gallery attendant in the Orpheus Room, but ill health combined with financial pressures caused her to give up sculpting and return to sewing in her last years.^[2]

Quiner worked exclusively in plaster during her career.^[3] Her best-known work is a portrait of Robert Rantoul, cast in plaster and presented to the Athenaeum in 1842;^[2] it was the first sculpture by a woman to be shown there when it was exhibited in 1846.^[4] She also crafted portrait busts of Fitch Poole, Alonzo Lewis, and James Frothingham,^[2] whose own portrait of the sculptor is held by the Beverly Public Library in Beverly, Massachusetts.^[5]

The Beverly Historical Society collection includes portrait busts of Quiner's father and of Phebe Ann Coffin Hanaford, a good friend. Hanaford wrote a biographical sketch of Quiner,^[2] and also penned two sonnets inspired by her and her work.^[6]

Death

Quiner died either at her sister's residence in Lynn^[7] or in her hometown of Beverly, and is buried in the Central Cemetery in Beverly.^[1] A laudatory notice appeared in the Beverly Citizen around the time of her death.^[8]