Crossword Genius

Influential artist embodied by Spall occasionally (7)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

seminal

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'influential' is the definition.
(seminal can mean important or influential)

'artist embodied by spall occasionally' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'artist' could be 'emin' (I've seen this before) and 'emin' is found in the answer.
The remaining letters 'sal' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This explanation may well be incorrect...

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for seminal that I've seen before include "Menials giving rise to new beginnings" , "Original and influential" , "Strongly influencing future developments" , "Menials (anag) - creative" , "Major" .)

I've seen this clue in The Telegraph.
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