Tuesday 31 October 2017

Two Statues of Queen Caroline





Queen Caroline
Monument at Stowe.
Portland Stone
Attributed to Rysbrack
c.1726.






http://faculty.bsc.edu/jtatter/caroline.html


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Queen Caroline
Henry Cheere
Queens College
Oxford.





Over the Gate way of Queens College, underneath a cupola facing onto the High Street.
Presented to the college in 1735 by the Provost Joseph smith in recognition of the queens gift of £1,000 to the building fund of the college in 1733.

Dr Magrath in The Queens College says that the cost of the statue was £125 - the design was approved by Dr George Clarke and Sir James Thornhill.

A Black plaster bust in the Lower Library is of the Queen and is perhaps a study for the head of this statue.

Info above from Catalogue of Portraits... Oxford,. Mrs Reginald Lane Poole, pub Oxford 1925.

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Pages below from The Queens College Vol II by John Richard Magrath DD, pub. Oxford. 1921.

see - The Queens College, John Richard Magrath, 1921 available on line at

https://archive.org/details/queenscollege02magr



















Image result for Hawksmoor Queens College Oxford


Photographs here by William Fox Talbot. 1843.

William Henry Fox Talbot: Part of Queens College, Oxford, September 1843




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Sunday 29 October 2017

George I Marble bust by Michael Rysbrack - Christchurch Gallery, Oxford




George I 
A Marble Bust 
by Michael Rysbrack - 
Christchurch Gallery, Oxford.


see also

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/busts-of-william-iii-george-i-and.html






























































Photographs by the author
With many thanks to Jacqueline Kellerman. Curator at The Christ Church Picture Gallery for allowing me to photograph and publish this and the other Christ Church bust in this blog.


The lead Equestrian Statue of George I
Stowe, Buckinghamshire.




























Photographs by the Author.

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Lead Bust of George I

Private Collection

For my original post for this bust and much more on the imagery of George I -
both 2 and 3 dimensional see -

https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/unrecorded-lead-bust-of-george-i.html

Thursday 26 October 2017

Some Further Examples of Sculptures of George II.




Three Further Examples of Statues of George II.










George II
Michael Rysbrack
Old Royal Naval Hospital.
Greenwich.




Image courtesy the Welcome Library




Image courtesy the Welcome Library


_________________________________


The Inscription on the pedestal.








{On the south face of plinth:}


PRINCIPI POTENTISSIMO
GEORGIO SECUNDO
BRITANNIARUM REGI
CUJUS AUSPICIIS ET PATROCINIO
AUGUSTISSIMUM HOC HOSPITIUM
AD SUBLEVANDOS MILITANTIUM IN CLASSE EMERITORIUM
LABORES A REGIS IPSIUS ANTECESSORIBUS FUNDATUM
AUCTIUS IN DIES ET SPLENDIDIUS EX(S)URGIT
JOHANNES JENNINGS EQUES
EJUSDEM HOSPITII PRAEFECTUS
ICONEM HANC PRO DEBITA SUA
ERGA PRINCIPEM REVERENTIA
ET PATRIAM CHARITATE
POSUIT
ANNO DOMINI
MDCCXXXV

{“To the almighty emperor, King George II of Britain, under whose direction and patronage this magnificent hospital, established by the king’s own predecessors to alleviate the burdens of retired seamen, is rising up, expanding and becoming more splendid every day.  Sir John Jennings, governor of the same establishment, placed this image in due reverence for the King and for the love of his country in the year of our Lord 1735.”}
{On the east face of plinth:}

HIC REQUIES SENECTAE
HIS MODUS LASSO MARIS ET VIARUM
MILITIAEQ(UE)

{“Here is a rest for old age, an end for someone who is tired of sailing the seas and fighting.”  From Horace’s Odes (Book 2 Part 6).}
{On the plinth, north (river) face:}
HIC AMES DICI PATER ATQ(UE) PRINCEPS
{“Here may you delight in being called our father and prince” From Horace’s Odes (Book 1 Part 2) and was originally addressed to Emperor Augustus.}
{relief carving of the Royal Standard 1714-1801}
 IMPERIUM PELAGI
{“The dominion of the sea”}
{On the west face of plinth:}
FESSOS TUTO PLACIDISSIMA PORTU ACCIPIT
{“This most peaceful place welcomes those who are weary to its safe haven.”  From Virgil’s Aeneid (Book 3 Chapter 4).}

This translation from     http://www.londonremembers.com/memorials/george-ii-statue-at-greenwich



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Statue of George II, on the King's Pillar,
by an anonymous sculptor perhaps Michael Rysbrack
Stowe House, Buckinghamshire.




The King's Pillar is a monument to George II, It consists of a Corinthian column over 30 feet high topped by a statue over seven feet high of George in his state robes. The monument was erected by Lord Cobham in 1724, when George was still Prince of Wales, and it was originally  located just to the south of the Great Cross Walk, one of the major avenues in the garden layout of Charles Bridgeman and Sir John Vanbrugh.

The King's Pillar remained in place until 1840, when it was taken down and the statue moved north of the house. The statue was sold in 1921.


In Tthe Stowe sales of the 1920's  most of the statuary was sold. Surprisingly, both George I and Princess Caroline survived. 

The statue of Princess Caroline and the equestrian King George I waere restored in 1992 as a part of the English Heritage grant programme. 

George II, however, was bought by Sir Phillip Sassoon, and now forms an integral part of the wonderful garden at Port Lympne (below). 

Port Lympne Hotel - 33 of 41



Another version of the copy of this statue was recently on the market.









After  160 years, a replacement King's Pillar is now back in the place of the original in the garden. The National Trust completed this project during the summer of 2004. The

Originally, the monument to his wife, Queen Caroline, was also nearby: downhill and to his left, in a small theatre and surrounded by statues of shepherds and shepherdesses. She and her entourage also faced the Rotunda. The Queen's monument was subsequently moved in the 1760's to the west side of the Home Park on the original site of the Belvedere, or Temple of Fame, where it still stands. The reflecting pool that lay between the Queen's monument and the Rotunda was filled in at that time.

The King's Pillar bears this inscription from Horace's Ode 15, Book IV:

GEORGIO AUGUSTO.
Crevere Vires, Famaque & Imperi
Porrecta Majestas ad ortum
Solis ab Hesperio Cubili
Custode rerum Cæsare-----

The Seeley Guidebooks provide the following translation of the above:

Under the care of Cæsar's scepter'd hand,
With strength and fame increas'd, this favour'd Land
The Majesty of her vast Empire spread,
From the Sun rising to his Western bed.

This translation, and the way in which the quotation is lifted out of the context of the rest of the ode, obscure an underlying concern of Horace's about Augustus Caesar (and perhaps a similar concern of the Temple family about George II). While the Latin name and the power of Italy have increased in size, Horace says, the dignity and the reputation of the government have been laid low. The power of Caesar is shown in contrast to the ideals of the Roman Republic, a tension that reappears a number of times throughout the garden.

The National Trust reported.


The present owner has kindly allowed the National Trust to make a cast of the statue in reconstituted Portland stone, and this is funded by the Trust's continuing Stowe Statues Appeal. It is not known what happened to the original pedestal and pillar, but from the diameter of the cornice found by the archaeologist, one can calculate the height of the original column with the use of classical rules. The restored pedestal, column, and statue measure 13.5 meters.



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George II
John van Nost III
This has been atributed to Benjamin Rackstrow of the Strand but I remain sceptical.
Lead
Destroyed 1937
Formerly on The Weavers Hall, The Coombe, Dublin.

This is my particular favourite.

see my blog post for much fuller details of this statue

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.co.uk/2016/09/george-ii-weavers-hall-dublin.html





Wednesday 25 October 2017

Busts of George II and John First Earl Ligonier by Roubiliac





The Busts of George II, (1683 - 1760), 
and John First Earl Ligonier (1680 - 1770).
by Louis Francois Roubiliac Roubiliac.
Royal Collection.

This post updated 1 August 2023.

See  my previous two posts.










________________



John First Earl Ligonier (1680 - 1770).

Louis Francois Roubiliac.

Height 67 x 71 cms.

































Royal Collection Trust/© Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, 2017.

The Royal Collection Website Description.

This outstanding example illustrates his ability to memorialize a character and to convince the viewer of the real presence of steel, cotton, hair, silk and fur where in fact there is only white marble. It seems likely that this bust was commissioned by or for Lord Ligonier, probably in connection with his office as Commander-in-Chief of British forces from 1757-1759. 

Ligonier was born at Castres in France to a Huguenot family that was forced to emigrate after 1685. He joined the British army in 1702 and was able to purchase a captaincy by 1703, attaining the rank of Field Marshal in 1766 after a career of sixty years. He served under Marlborough at Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet, with the Duke of Cumberland in 1745, and ultimately as Master General of the Ordnance. 

He became a close confidant of George II, who invested him as a Knight of the Bath on the battlefield of Dettingen in 1743.

 Aggressive by instinct and humane as a commander, he has been called the most outstanding general in the British army between Marlborough and Wellington, and in his time he shared something of their fame, and a degree of notoriety from the ‘harem’ he kept at Downe Place at Cobham in Surrey. 

The different forms of signature of this bust and that of George II, RCIN 31614 suggest that Roubiliac created his portrait of Ligonier from the life, but not that of the King, who may even have died before it was finished. The aged features of John, 1st Earl Ligonier are fixed with unsparing realism. His raised eyebrows which seem to scan the horizon, perhaps across an extensive battlefield, are rendered with astonishing skill. 

This text was adapted from The First Georgians: Art and Monarchy 1714 - 1760, London, 2014.

Provenance.

John, 1st Earl Ligonier; by inheritance to Mrs Lloyd of Gloucester Place, London, by whom presented to George IV on 27 June 1817.

The text here was lifted from the Royal Collection website, but omitting the first few sentences regarding Roubiliac working with Balthazar Permoser in Dresden, which so far has not been confirmed with any documentary evidence, although as research progresses it certainly appears that Roubiliac spent some of his early years in Germany before returning to Paris in the 1720's

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THE NPG Terracotta Bust of Ligonier.










..........................

Drawing attributed to sculptor Joseph Nollekens.

Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston.






The plaster version was apparently set on  square socle with a medallion at the front. As in the type used earlier for the bust of Andrew Fantaine. 

________________

The NPG say -

"NPG 2013 corresponds with the undated marble at Windsor incised L.F.Roubiliac sc. ad Vivum and must be the model. Mrs Esdaile places it possibly circa 1748 but more probably from the last years of the sculptor's life.  

Roubiliac died 1762. Ligonier received the Bath in 1743 but sittings would have been difficult before the end of the war, 1748.

 In 1926 W. T. Whitley discovered a contemporary reference to 'A Bust' of the sitter exhibited by Roubiliac at the Society of Artists 1761 (153) and an entry 3 February 1763 'To paid Mr Roubilliacs bill for £153 11s’has been found in the regimental account kept by Ligonier's agent Richard Cox. [2] 

The payment, which must have been to the sculptor's estate, has been taken to refer to the Windsor marble, but unfortunately the supporting personal ledger where details might have been expected cannot be traced. [3] 

Mrs Esdaile believed the marble was a royal commission; this is prima facie evidence to the contrary. Furthermore, according to Benjamin Justham, inventory clerk to George IV, the Roubiliac busts of Ligonier and George II were presented, 27 June 1817, by a Thomas Lloyd of 112 Gloucester Place, London. [4]

 

Four plasters and a mould of the bust were in the Roubiliac sale of 1762, lots 11 and 47 of the 1st day, lot 4 of the 3rd day and lots 9 and 17 of the 4th day. [5] These have since disappeared.

 

Condition: cracks at the base of the shoulders and in front, below the star of the Bath and in the fur above the centre line of the breastplate, have been repaired; an area at the edge of the collar on his left shoulder has been painted in; the tip of his left shoulder is damaged at the back; a few small areas of white visible in some of the valleys of the wig; 19th-century(?) rose-coloured plaster socle now faded.

 

Collections: bought 1924, from dealer Basil Dighton of 3 Savile Row, W1, and believed by him to be of Lord St Vincent. Mrs Katherine Esdaile, however, states that the bust had ‘passed from a dealer in Norwich to the vendor and been called Lord Howe'. 

2. Letter, The Times, 28 December 1926, unpublished, NPG archives.

3. '1st Foot Guards Viscount Ligonier', f.137, archives of Messrs Lloyds Bank (Cox & King’s branch). Kindly verified by Mr M.A. Clancy, cp Whitworth, p.380 and note 2.

4. G. de Bellaigue, letter, 30 March 1972, NPG archives.

5. Esdaile, pp.219-27. [6]




Mezzotint.

by John Brooks, after James Latham.

 published mid 1740s-mid 1750s.


-----------------------------------

The Socles Roubiliac's Busts of Ligonier and George II.

in the Royal Collection.

https://pssauk.org/about/trustees/

- In a recent Art UK conference hosted by Holly Trusted of the Art UK Sculpture Steering Group Malcolm Baker gave a presentation on the socle in English Eighteenth Century Sculpture in which the busts of George II and Ligonier figured prominently.

The main thrust of the talk was to highlight the way a socle affects the viewing of a portrait bust - something that I have pondered ever since starting this research project over twenty years ago.


Malcolm Baker discusses the original position of these two busts in a pair of niches in what had been the home of Ligonier since 1730 at what is now 12 North Audley Street, Mayfair.


"Probably executed about 1760 and perhaps connected with Lord Ligonier's elevation to the peerage. These were almost certainly commissioned by Lord Ligonier himself. Payment of £153, an unusually large sum for two busts was recorded in the general's regimental accounts on the 12th February 1763. actually after Roubiliac's death, Lord Ligonier was a late payer obviously. Then in 1817, the two busts were presented to George V by Lord Ligonier's descender Thomas Lloyd. 

By the late 1820 both busts were displayed at Windsor where all the busts were placed on new circular socles, so as to form a harmonised display".


Although the socle for Lord Ligonier's own bust does not survive, that for George I. Has happily been brought to light in the course of Jonathan Marsden's work on his catalogue of sculpturing in the royal collection. 

............. his town house in Mayfair survives with its interiors intact. At the rear was an impressive gallery described as perhaps the most beautiful early Georgian roof surviving in London. This was probably designed between 1728 and 1730 by Sir Edward Lovett Pearce, best known for the Irish Houses of Parliament in Dublin. 

At each end they are just the right size to accommodate the unique busts and their unique socles rather than the niches being designed with the bust in mind it was the other way round. You have the bust and the gallery. So the busts were executed about 1760 to fit within the interior design some 30 years earlier. 

....... This may have prompted the effect of grandeur that makes these two busts exceptional. Did Lord Ligonier ask for busts with the panache and presence appropriate to this grand room? More than that, however, Roubiliac was evidently taking account not only of the scale of the niches but also of the other decorative features of the interior. Here I suggest lies the explanation for that unusually shaped cartouche. It may be atypical for Roubiliac but corresponds exactly with the shape employed in the centre of the room's chimney piece, perhaps the volutes that we see on the chimney piece"

 

The Gallery 12 North Audley Street



https://www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-london/vol39/pt1/plate-11