English 18th Century Portrait Sculpture: March 2019

Wednesday, 27 March 2019

The Busts of Oliver Cromwell Part 17. At The Lady Lever Art Gallery, The Russell Cotes Museum, and The Museum of Arts, Milwaukee. Update.

The Counterfeit Busts of Oliver Cromwell

at The Lady Lever Art Gallery,

The Russell Cotes Museum,

The Museum of Arts, Milwaukee.

The Tangye bust at the Museum of London.

Part 2.

Update.

Whilst this is a very subjective - it is my current opinion that these four busts are all 19th Century - the best one can say for them is that the quality of the carving is competent.

I have not yet seen any good photographs of the Tangye bust but expect to receive some imminently.

These busts are perhaps based on an original seen by George Vertue in the Rysbrack Studio in 1732 which is now missing although the planes of the flesh have more in common with the Harwood or Wilton busts.

There are minor variations in these busts particularly in the rivets on the breastplate but they all appear to have come from the same so far unidentified studio.

Oliver Cromwell.

Anonymous Marble Busts.

Left to Right - Russell Cotes Museum, Lady Lever Art Gallery, Museum of Art Milwaukee.

There are minor differences in these busts - note the rivets on the breastplate on the right proper of the Russel Cotes version and the conformation of the rivets on the breastplate of the other two.

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Oliver Cromwell.

Russell Cotes Museum, Bournemouth.

Marble Bust.

This bust has a spurious Roubiliac inscription.

RUBILIAC Sculpt

I am very grateful to Duncan Walker of the Russell Cotes Art Gallery and Museum for his input.

The spurious Roubiliac inscription on the back of the Russell Cotes bust of Cromwell.

Roubiliac would be turning in his grave!

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Oliver Cromwell.

Marble Bust.

Museum of Art Milwaukee.

This bust is inscribed OLIVER CROMWELL. ROUBILIAC

I am extremely grateful to both Rebekah Morin and Catherine Sawinski of the Museum of Art in Milwaukee for corresponding and providing the photographs of this bust.

Another spurious inscription.

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The Lady Lever Gallery Marble Bust of Oliver Cromwell.

My recent visit to the Lady Lever Art Gallery to photograph their bust of Cromwell and to obtain a glimpse of their files produced a photocopy photograph below and a few details of the owner of this bust in 1959.

Sold Sotheby's, 3 March 1959. Lot 141,

Bought by C Kerwin, 15 Davies Street, London, W1.

I am very grateful to David Moffat of the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight for welcoming me to the gallery and allowing me to see and copy the files relating to their bust of Cromwell.

Note: 15 Davies St became the home of the Grosvenor Gallery, founded by Eric Estorick in 1960.

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Marble Bust of Oliver Cromwell

Anonymous Sculptor

at the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight.

Update with new photographs taken by the author.

Probably Mid - late 19th century.

On a later Belgian Red Marble Socle.

With a spurious Rysbrack inscription

Purchased 28th July 1914 from Dealer D.L. Isaacs of New Oxford Street London (est. 1868) for £15.00

Original gallery number X43.

71 cm with socle.

For Isaacs see - https://antiquedealersblog.wordpress.com/tag/m-harris-sons/

Inscribed Raisback Sculp.

The miss spelled inscription.

Once again I am very grateful to David Moffat of the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight for welcoming me to the gallery and allowing me to see and copy the files relating to their bust of Cromwell.

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Oliver Cromwell.

Marble Bust.

In the collection of Sir Richard Tangye (1833 - 1906) in 1899.

Museum of London.

The Two Protectors : Oliver and Richard Cromwell.

by Tangye, Richard, Sir, 1833-1906.

pub 1899.

See page 106.

available online -

https://archive.org/details/twoprotectorsoli00tanguoft/page/n13

This bust is not the Russell Cotes Museum, the Lady Lever or the Milwaukee Museum bust.

but it is obviously related.

see also

The Cromwellian Collection of MSS., Miniatures Medals etc.... of Sir Richard Tangye pub 1905.

19th-century engineer Sir Richard Tangye was a noted Cromwell enthusiast and collector of Cromwell manuscripts and memorabilia.

His collection included many rare manuscripts and printed books, medals, paintings, objects d'art, and a bizarre assemblage of "relics". This includes Cromwell's Bible, button, coffin plate, death mask, and funeral escutcheon.

On Tangye's death, the entire collection was donated to the Museum of London, where it can still be seen.

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Tuesday, 26 March 2019

The Busts of Oliver Cromwell Part 16. - Three Marble busts - Government Art Collection, Ross Hamilton Sale, and Hovingham Hall.

Oliver Cromwell

Three more Marble busts.

One in the Government Art Collection,

another from the Christie's Ross Hamilton Sale,

and a further at Hovingham Hall.

In the Manner of Joseph Wilton.

for the signed Wilton Busts of Cromwell see -

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2019/02/oliver-cromwell-marble-bust-by-joseph.html

Provenance: With Arcade Gallery; from whom purchased by the Ministry of Works in January 1949

height: 61.50 cm, width: 52.00 cm, depth: 31.00 cm

Inscribed on base: OLIVER CROMWELL / ANGLIAE &C &C / PROTECTOR

Purchased from the Arcade Gallery, January 1949.

Most recent known location : British Embassy (The Hague, Netherlands).

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Marble Bust of Oliver Cromwell.
Anonymous

Not inscribed.

Sold from the Collection of London dealer Ross Hamilton by Christie's of South Kensington. Lot 163, 27th February 2013.

Height 68 cms.

The quality of the carving of this bust, although now somewhat obscured by restoration / repolishing ? suggests to me that it is a 19th century replica based on the Wilton bust now in the Government Art Collection.

The surface of this bust is somewhat ill defined and has probably been re polished after spending some time outside and exposed to the weather.

There is another loose version of these busts at the Worsley family home Hovingham Hall in Yorkshire (see below).

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The Hovingham Bust of Oliver Cromwell.

For an update see my post -

https://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2019/04/unsigned-marble-bust-of-oliver-cromwell.html

In 1778 Thomas Worsley records in his catalogue a plaster? bust of Cromwell in the drawing room in a niche over the chimney (now disappeared). This bust is mentioned as being in a niche over the chimneypiece in the dining room at Hovingham in Vallis Eboracensis: Comprising the History and Antiquities of Easingwold and ...By Thomas Gill pub. 1852.

Hovingham is country house of c. 1750 -1774 with an additional 19 century servants' wing. Built by Thomas Worsley VI for himself. Craftsmen included Jonathan Rose the plasterer; John Devall Junior who provided an Ionic chimney-piece; Moss, Kelsey and West joiners; Jelfe the mason; Abbott the painter and (Richard?) Lawrence the woodcarver, all of whose names appear in Thomas Worsley's accounts held at Hovingham.

For Hovingham see - https://www.hovingham.co.uk/hovingham-hall/history.html

https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1315690

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The three busts pictured below (the Russel Coats version, the Milwaukee version, and the Lady Lever version) all very much resemble the Hovingham bust in the hair and facial details, but the collar and armour are quite different.

The Hovingham bust resembles facially the signed and dated Wilton bust in the Government Art Collection.

A bust of Cromwell was first noted at Hovingham in 1778

It is something of a leap of faith but the bust of Cromwell by Lawrence Anderson Holme, now missing and recorded as exhibited at the Society of Artists in 1766 is perhaps closely related to the busts of Cromwell (all unsigned) depicted below, given that Holme had been associated with Joseph Wilton and Cappizoldi and the manufacture and carving of the State coach.

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The Busts of Oliver Cromwell. Part 15. Miniature Ivory bust of Oliver Cromwell attributed to Jacob Dobberman - Christie's

Miniature Ivory bust of Oliver Cromwell

Inscribed JD FC

Jacob Dobberman.

Sold by Christie's, London Lot 112 - 9 July 2009.

5¾ in. (14.6 cm.) high; 9 in. (22.8 cm.) high, overall

Provenance:

Mary Morrison by whom bequeathed to Catharine Dent-Brocklehurst and by descent.

For what its worth - I think the JD inscription is probably spurious - added sometime after its production perhaps to increase its value.

Catalogue entry and photographs lifted directly from Christies's Website

https://www.christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-carved-ivory-bust-of-oliver-cromwell-5224012-details.aspx

Jacob Dobbermann was a virtuoso carver of both ivory and amber who spent much of his life working in Germany in the first half of the 18th century. He was certainly in London in 1711 but returned to Germany no later than 1716 where assumed the role of court sculptor to Charles, Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel and, later, his son William VIII.

Dobbermann was well versed in the art of carving in relief and in three dimensions as his highly accomplished plaque of Neptune and Amphitrite in the Reiner Winkler collection, Germany, and his figure of Henry VI in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, testify (Theuerkauff, loc. cit., and V and A website; http://collections.vam.ac.uk/objectid/O89318 respectively). In both instances Dobberman demonstrates his great skill in carving the minute details of the hair and beard while also showing great dexterity in rendering the multiple textures of drapery.

With the bust of Oliver Cromwell offered here, Dobbermann demonstrates this same skill while also showing great sensitivity in the rendering of the Lord Protector's facial features. Despite the fact that he would have been working from an engraving or a miniature, he managed to achieve great naturalism in the carving of the furrowed brow, the broad jaw and cleft chin as well as in the delicacy of the hair, moustache and collar - one small corner of which has lifted as if caught by a gust of wind.

While it is not clear exactly how long Dobbermann spent in London, he is known to have been in Godfrey Kneller's academy in 1711 and to have also been a member of the Rose and Crown Club in the same year. It is therefore highly likely that Dobbermann carved the bust of Cromwell during this period. This dating is further corroborated by the fact that the bust is unlike other known work by Dobbermann and is, in fact, much more closely related to the works of his French contemporary David Le Marchand (1674-1726), who was working in London in precisely the same years (see Avery, op. cit., nos. 38 and 69, for example). The connection between the two may be through the painter Godfrey Kneller; le Marchand knew the former from having carved his portrait in circa 1710 (now in the Thomson collection, Toronto, see Avery, op. cit., p. 74, no. 39) and Dobbermann would have known Kneller through the Academy. It is therefore highly likely that the latter introduced his young German compatriot to the well-connected Frenchman. The importance of this bust must, therefore, be appreciated on multiple levels: it is a very rare sculptural portrait of this sitter, it represents the artist's virtuosity in his craft, it is emblematic of his development and influences and, most interestingly, embodies the creative atmosphere of London in the early 18th century.

Literature.

C. Theuerkauff, Elfenbein - Sammlung Reiner Winkler, Munich, 1984, II, no. 3, pp. 26-8. Edinburgh, London and Leeds,

National Gallery of Scotland, British Museum and Leeds City Art Gallery, David le Marchand 1674-1726 'An Ingenious Man for Carving in Ivory', 7 Mar.- 6 May 1996, 23 May - 15 Sept. 1996 and 2 Oct. 1996 - 5 Jan. 1997.

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Oliver Cromwell

van der Hagen

after Rysbrack.

Victoria and Albert Museum.

Monday, 25 March 2019

The Busts of Oliver Cromwell, Part 14. The Anonymous Marble Bust at the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight.

Marble Bust of Oliver Cromwell Anonymous Sculptor. at the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight.

Update with new photographs taken by the author.

Probably Mid - late 19th century.

On a later Belgian Red Marble Socle.

This bust is perhaps based on an original seen by George Vertue in the Rysbrack Studio in 1732 which is now missing.

There are minor variations in these busts but they all appear to have come from the same studio

For three other versions of this bust The Russell Cotes Museum Bust, The Milwaukee Arts Museum Bust and the Sir Richard Tangye bust in the London Museum see my previous posts -

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2019/02/busts-of-oliver-cromwell-at-lady-lever.html

http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2019/03/bust-of-cromewell-with.html