Adelaide Alsop Robineau

Considered a top ceramist in the field of American art pottery, Adelaide Alsop Robineau (1865 – 1929) was a well known china painter and potter with a specialty in porcelain carving. Her masterpiece, the Scarab Vase (ca. 1910), took more than 1,000 hours to create, but it was named the most important piece of American ceramics of the last 100 years as of the year 2000 by Art & Antiquities Magazine.

In her early years, Adelaide was a young drawing teacher at the boarding school where she was a student in Middletown, Connecticut. After a class of advanced training in drawing and painting, Adelaide would continue her studies at Alfred University with fellow students Charles Binns and Taxile Doat. At the turn of the century, After meeting and marrying Samuel E. Robineau, Adelaide launched Keramic Studio, a publication dedicated to potters and the ceramic arts. For the great majority of the publications active years (1899 – 1919), Adelaide served as the sole editor and taught china painting classes to the locals of Syracuse, New York.

Adelaide frequently experimented with glazes and forms, showing influences of Japonisme and fine detail, often using needles to achieve her incredible detail in her porcelain works. In the 1920s, she taught at Syracuse University and the Art Academy of People’s University.

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