Friday 21 March 2014

18th Century engravings of the Bust of Alexander Pope

          An 18th Century Engraving of a bust of Alexander Pope
                               by Louis Francois Roubiliac
     and several other Eighteenth Century engravings of Pope busts.

This is a scan of a  photocopy of a small anonymous engraving of a  bust of Alexander Pope by Louis Francois Roubiliac. I discovered it in a file on Alexander Pope in the Heinz Archives of the National Portrait Gallery.

It shows a bust which is so close to the Garrick / Shipley that is unlikely to be any other - the bottom of the bust is truncated and the inscription giving his age as LIII matches that on the Garrick bust. The Barber Type busts are longer in the body and show the chemise drawn together at its base.


Scan from Wimsatt. Showing another bust of a similar type dated 1748.



Lettered below image with title, production detail: "Ang. Kauffman inv.", "P W Tomkins Sculpt. pupil of F. Bartolozzi" and publication line: "Published as the Act directs 1st of March 1783 by J. Watts Featherstone Buildings Holborn" British Museum.


Three female figures in a park, one reaching up to place a crown of laurels on a bust at left, a lyre resting at the foot of the pedestal, the other two reading from a volume at right; oval design; after Kauffman. 1783
Stipple and etching printed in red ink. British Museum




Three female figures in a park, one reaching up to place a crown of laurels on a bust at left, a lyre resting at the foot of the pedestal, the other two reading from a volume at right; oval design; after Kauffman. 1783 Stipple and etching. British Museum



These three engravings show a bust of Pope with a distinct forward lean - very similar to the plaster bust at Stourhead.




Unmounted fan-leaf, with a bust of Alexander Pope on a pedestal, attended by three muses, one of whom holds a laurel wreath towards the bust. The scene is similar to Schreiber 13 unmounted, but larger and with fewer musical attributes. Stipple engraving. British Museum


Another Ffan leaf from the British Museum