Westminster Abbey or Glorious Victory

COMMEMORATIVE ENGLISH SCULPTURE OF THE 18TH CENTURY“WESTMINSTER ABBEY OR GLORIOUS VICTORY!”

[]On February 14th 1797, perhaps fuelled by the

knowledge that money had already been voted by

Parliament for the commissioning of monuments to

honour men who had died for their country, Nelson led

the attack on Spanish ships at Cape Vincent with the

battle cry: “Westminster Abbey or Glorious Victory!”

[]Westminster Abbey, consecrated under Edward the

Confessor in 1065, had been the burial place of

English monarchs beginning with William I. However,

during the reign of Elizabeth I the Abbey also came

to be seen as a temple of fame because so many of her

favourites were allowed to be buried there, and with

the surge of nationalistic pride her reign

engendered, the vacant chapels in the Abbey were

gradually filled with the monumental gothic

sepulchres of her lords, ladies, and councillors. But

it was not until the 18th century that the Abbey

began to rapidly fill up with great stone monuments

honouring the virtuous, the heroic, and the

scholarly.

[]During the 18th century Westminster Abbey had

become a very popular public space, open to visitors

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both from home and abroad. It was such a favoured

attraction that guide books were produced, and each

time a new monument was unveiled the event was deemed

worthy of mention in one of the periodicals. When the

Monument to Isaac Newton was erected in 1731 it was not

only described in great detail in The Gentleman’s

Magazine but engravings of the monument were available

in Italy before the actual ceremony had taken place.

[]The reason why the commemoration of the meritous

rather than the privileged is such an important

element of the 18th century, is because it reflects

the profoundly radical individualism which was at the

seat of the intellectual movement which shook the

foundations of Western civilisation - the

Enlightenment. This cult of the individual was born

during the Italian Renaissance when the many

scientific and artistic achievements made by men such

as Petrarch, Galileo and Brunelleschi were not simply

recognised but greatly honoured. The fact that these

and other individuals gained prominence through their

own merit had a profound effect, not only on their

sense of self, but also on those around them. For

example, Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) himself an artist

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and architect felt empowered by his association with

Michelangelo (1475-1564), among other great men of

the 16th century, to record the lives and

achievements of artists, primarily Italian, from the

13th century until his own lifetime. This awareness

of the greatness of individual artists may have also

prompted the grand funeral of Michelangelo when he

died in 1564, and the erection of a splendid monument

in Santa Croce, the so-called “pantheon” of Florence.

[SLIDE] Among the 300 great men commemorated there

are Macchiavelli (1469-1527); Galileo (1564-1642);

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519); and Lorenzo Ghiberti

(1378-1455). This desire to honour eminent men was

such that in Florence there was a move to recover the

bones of famous Florentines who had died in exile.

However, the people of Florence were not the only

citizens who understood the importance of being the

home of the relics of such men. The people of

Ravenna, which was where Dante (1265-1321) had died,

refused to let the poet’s remains be taken back to

Florence. And when Lorenzo de Medici applied to the

people of Spoleto for the body of the painter, Fra

Filippo Lippi who had died in 1469 whilst at work in

their cathedral, they begged to be allowed to keep it

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because [quote] “Spoleto lacked any great marks of

distinction and especially the adornment of eminent

men” whereas [q]“Florence had countless famous

citizens...and so it could do without this one”. [1]

[unqte] Although Lorenzo conceded this he was still

determined to pay the artist the greatest honour he

could, and thus sent the painter’s son, Filippino, to

construct a fabulous marble monument in the cathedral

at Spoleto. [SLIDE]

[]The cult of the individual was, as has already been

said, also at the root of the Enlightenment movement

because men such as the English mathematician, Isaac

Newton (1642-1727), had shown that the universe was

governed by rational laws which were accessible to

human beings through the scientific method of

experiment and observation. Man’s ability to

rationalise the universe helped to free him from

blindly accepting the authority of a corrupt church,

as well as that of dictatorial secular leaders. These

discoveries caused many Enlightenment thinkers to

enthrone the individual as the centre and creator of

meaning. The 17th-century French mathematician

Descartes (1596-1650), who was much admired by the

intellectuals of the 18th century, doubted everything1[]Vasari p.222

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except himself whom he saw as the irreducible

thinking being. This led him to utter the famous

quote “I think, therefore I am...”. It was this

valorisation of the individual that helped to change

18th-century attitudes towards death and

commemoration.

[]In 1733 there had been 3 monuments in the north

transept of Westminster Abbey, but by 1760 it was

completely filled by monuments to naval heroes. The

nave and crossing was almost full by the 1750s, and a

Poet’s Corner in the south transept was firmly

established by the end of the 1720s. Although many of

the monuments erected in the Abbey during the 18th

century contain similar elements such as the pyramid;

seated or standing mourning female figures; winged or

unwinged boys holding draped medallion portraits; and

busts all’antica, the profusion of styles of

monuments showed that sculptors were greatly affected

by different trends from abroad, whether Classicism

or Baroque from Rome, as well as French Rococo.

[]Prior to this English sculpture had been marred by

a confusion of style and weakness of handling which

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had been largely caused by the lack of academical

training and knowledge of drawing. Some steps were

taken in 1711 to create better facilities by the

establishment of an Academy under the direction of

Sir Godfrey Kneller (c.1649-1723) and sculpture had

a place in this movement for Francis Bird (1667-

1731), one of the leading sculptors during this

period, was a Director. It is apparent however that

the training for a young sculptor was as yet still

quite limited as it consisted in drawing from casts

of Antique works such as the Apollo Belvedere; the

Laocoon; the dying Gaul (at first believed to be a

Gladiator). However as Englishmen began to travel to

Italy as part of their education, new ideas for

sculpture were brought back to England. Among those

artists who went to Italy was Francis Bird as well as

the architects, William Kent and James Gibbs who

benefited from studying at first hand, artifacts of

antiquity as well as contemporary Roman art. On their

return to England they were all in demand as

designers of monuments in Westminster Abbey and

elsewhere, and the fact that many aristocratic

patrons sought the services of architects rather than

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masons suggest that there was a new awareness of the

part of these patrons of the need for good design.

[]Francis Bird is responsible for many of the

monuments of the early part of the 18th century

erected in Westminster Abbey. Some of these are

considered very fine and others not so good. One of

his most impressive monuments is the Monument to Dr John

Ernest Grabe erected after 1711 in the south transept.

[SLIDE] The design of this monument reflects the

effect of Bird’s stay in Rome, the finely carved

figure of the doctor sits on a delicate curved marble

sarcophagus. The mass of crumpled folds of drapery on

the lap of the doctor may have been inspired by the

Baroque sculpture of Bernini. [SLIDE] [SLIDE]

[]One late work by Bird in the Abbey which is

particularly engaging, though it shows little Italian

influence, is the Monument to William Congreve erected in

the nave c.1729. [SLIDE] Congreve (1670-1729) was a

famous dramatist of the Restoration. He left the bulk

of his fortune to Henrietta, Duchess of Marlborough

with whom he had been intimate! It was she who

commissioned Bird to design the monument, consisting

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of a sarcophagus on which are a selection of masks

and books, attributes of the playwright. Above them

is a large bas-relief medallion portrait in an oval

surround which is based on a portrait of Congreve by

Kneller from the Kit-Kat series.[2] Even if the name

of Congreve may be forgotten, the placement of his

monument, as well as the form and treatment of the

portrait will help to convey Congreve’s status, and

by the inclusion of the theatrical attributes the

sculptor also ensures that the deceased will continue

to be identified as an important dramatist for

posterity.

[]Poet’s Corner, centred around the gothic, canopied

tomb of royal favourite, the poet Geoffrey Chaucer

(c.1340-1400) which was erected in 1556, was firmly

established in the 1720s when the poet, Alexander

Pope (1688-1744), drew the attention of the public,

in a poem written in 1720, to the fact that though

John Dryden (1631-1700) had received a magnificent

funeral he had been buried without an appropriate

monument. By 1724 James Gibbs had been commissioned

by John Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham to erect a

2[]In NPG dated 1709

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large, Neoclassical monument which included a bust of

the poet crowned with a laurel wreath.

[]It was this intervention, as well as the erection

of a Monument to Matthew Prior (discussed below), that

not only heralded the demand for monuments in honour

of other English poets, dramatists, and writers but

also helped to change the status of the funerary

monument itself because prior to this, most monuments

had tended to be the work of anonymous stone masons

rather than distinguished architects. For a short

time during the 18th century the collaboration

between sculptor and architect became the rule rather

than the exception; for example the monument to

Newton was commissioned from the architect William

Kent and sculpted by the Flemish sculptor Micheal

Rysbrack. [SLIDE] It was signed by both but with

their participation clearly delineated. William

Kent’s Latinised name appears under the pile of books

on which the great scientist leans. It proudly

declares that Kent is a painter and architect who

invented (invenit) the monument whereas on the other

side, partially obscured by the bare foot of Newton

it is just possible to read the phrase stating that

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Micheal Rysbrack “sculpsit” (Latin for sculpted it).

In this case however, Rysbrack triumphed in the eyes

of posterity because it is he who is credited with

the creation of the monument not Kent.

[]Rysbrack also collaborated with James Gibbs on the

Monument to Matthew Prior which had been erected in

Poet’s Corner in 1723. [SLIDE] Gibbs had designed a

setting for a bust of Prior which had been executed

by the French sculptor, Antoine Coysevox at the turn

of the century. That Rysbrack did not exactly follow

the architect’s design is evident from comparing the

monument with the drawing in Gibbs’s A Book of Architecture

(1728). The overall setting is simple with the bust

set on a dark sarcophagus, framed by a circular niche

in a blue grey marble background surmounted by a

pediment, but the poses of the two female figures

representing the Muses - Clio and Thalia, which were

the work of the sculptor, are strongly contrapposto.

(Clio is the muse of History and carries a book).

(Thalia is the muse of poetry and comedy, and carries

a recorder and scroll). This, as well as the strong

use of the drapery has the effect of lending greater

animation to the figures than if the sculptor had

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followed the more static design which had been the

intention of the architect. Unfortunately, despite

Rysbrack’s creativity, for which he received much

critical acclaim, he was paid only £35 pounds for

each figure out of the £100 per figure that Gibbs had

received from the patron.

[]It may have been this work that brought the

sculptor to the attention of the artist, Sir Godfrey

Kneller, as he lay on his sickbed in 1722, planning

his own monument. That such a famous and so vain a

man as Kneller selected Rysbrack was undoubtedly a

great honour for the sculptor. However, it was not

necessarily for his invention but for his skill at

following another’s design that Rysbrack was chosen,

and it is apparent that the actual monument differed

only very slightly from Kneller’s original design

(which is held in the British Museum).[3] [SLIDE]

[]Kneller had intended that the monument would be

erected in his parish church in Twickenham, but the

prime position he wished for it was already occupied

3[]The monument was later moved to a position in the Abbeywhich entailed the removal of the great marble canopy whichoriginally draped above and around the monument.

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by a monument to Alexander Pope’s father. A few days

before the artist died he invited Pope to visit him

and then asked if the poet would move his father’s

monument. Pope later reported that Kneller had also

said: [q]

many gross things in relation to himself and the

memory he should leave behind him. He said

he should not like to lie among the rascals at

Westminster Abbey, a memorial there would be

sufficient and he desired me to write an epitaph for

it.[4]

[]Although Pope agreed to write the epitaph he

refused to allow the repositioning of his father’s

monument despite Lady Kneller’s later petition to the

Doctors’ Commons for its removal. Pope based his

legal defence on the grounds that the proposed design

[q] “a vast three-hundred -pound-Pyle” would damage

the fabric of the church as well as posing a threat

to the safety of those sitting nearby.[5] Pope won his

case, and although Kneller was buried in the

churchyard his monument was eventually erected in

Westminster Abbey in 1730.[6]

4[]Webb, Rysbrack, p.52

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[]Kneller’s reputation as a vain man suggests that he

probably cut a very conspicuous figure in society,

and his self-portrait of c.1711 confirms that

supposition. [SLIDE] In it he identifies himself as a

courtier (wearing the gold medal awarded him by the

King when he was knighted), and as a landowner (in

the background the artist includes a view of Whitton

Hall, built by Kneller between 1709[-]1711). It is

also obvious from his design for his monument that he

wanted to appear as a younger man than he was,

handsome and full of vigour. Rysbrack translated this

pose into that of a poet, en neglige, apparently in full

command of his creativity. The dynamic and Baroque

style of the bust would have appealed to the vanity

of the artist who, Pope later said, had agreed with

his tongue-in-cheek remark: [q]“Sir Godfrey, I

believe if God Almighty had had your assistance, the

world would have been formed more perfect.”[7]

[]Rysbrack’s greatest success was as the sculptor of

the Isaac Newton monument and when it was erected in

1731, his reputation and his practice was firmly

5[]Brownell, Pope, p.3526[]As a point of fact, Kneller is the only artist to have beencommemorated in Westminster Abbey.7[]Collins-Baker, p.78

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established. He was the only sculptor in the 1730s to

be a member of the prestigious St Luke’s Club (a

traditional gentleman’s dining club that had met

since the time of Van Dyke). His success also cast a

favourable light over the practice of English

sculpture in general, and as sculptors were more

often seen as ‘inventors’ rather than masons their

status began to rise and many more monuments were

graced with a sculptor’s signature. Later in the

century Flaxman was to remark that it was the [q]

“monumental encouragement given to sculpture in

England [that] affords noble occasions for the artist

to exercise his powers”. [uq][8]

[]One such monument was the Monument to John, Duke of Argyll

and Greenwich erected in the Abbey by the French

sculptor Louis-Francois Roubiliac who signed it ‘L.F.

Roubiliac invt sct 1745’. [SLIDE] Roubiliac (c1705-

1762), is often regarded as the greatest sculptor of

18th century England. He came to England c1732 and by

1738 he was sufficiently prosperous to take a house

in St Martin’s Lane and provide premises for a new

academy of arts, called the St Martin’s Lane Academy,

which was organised by Hogarth. In 1745 he was8[]Mem of TB in Church Mons, p.50

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teaching sculpture at the Academy and in 1755 became

a member of the Committee formed to bring the works

of English artists to the notice of the public.

Roubiliac’s first work in Westminster Abbey was the

aforementioned, enormously successful Argyll monument

erected in 1748. The engraver George Vertue (1684-

1756), whose notebooks provide a great deal of

information on artists and collections in the 17th

and early 18th centuries, considered that this work

not only showed [q] “ the greatness of his genius in

his invention, design and execution, in every part

equal if not superior, to any others,” [uq] but also

outshone [q] “for nobless and skill, all those before

done by the best sculptors this fifty years past”.

[uq] [9] The treatment of the monument was very

different to what had been seen in the Abbey before,

and reflected Roubiliac’s training which had taken

place under the great German Baroque sculptor,

Balthasar Permoser in Dresden, and also the influence

of the Rococo sculptor, Nicholas Coustou in whose

studio Roubiliac had worked for a while before moving

to England.

9[]In Gunnis p.329

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[]Roubiliac’s dramatic design breaks with tradition

in its dramatic asymmetry; the Duke sits on the

sarcophagus, his legs hanging down over edge, his

body twisted so that his elbow leans on the thigh of

the figure of Fame who is writing the name of the

deceased on the pyramid of eternity which stands as a

backdrop. The figures on either side of the pedestal

represent Valor, who is seated, on the right, and

Eloquence on the left. It was this figure with her

vigorous gesture reaching into the space of the

earthly world, that impressed later sculptors such as

Antonio Canova who regarded it as one of the finest

statues he had seen in Europe.

[]Religious attitudes during the 18th century had

also changed, many no longer accepted that one needed

to live a pious life to achieve otherworldly

salvation, or that a good death was all it took to

achieve God’s blessing, it was more important to make

the most of one’s individual God-given talents. Many

intellectuals saw God as the great creator who had

set the world in motion but had then left man to make

the best of it. And thus if God had not interfered in

the running of the world since the creation then

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there was no need of religion. And it was the

repudiation of a corrupt church which resulted in

most monuments erected during the 18th century being

largely devoid of overt Christian imagery,

concentrating on the life of the individual rather

than the afterlife. However, amongst all the secular

monuments being erected during the second half of the

18th century Roubiliac’s memorial work often

contained religious imagery. One of the most

remarkable of these is the Monument to General William

Hargreve, erected 1757. [SLIDE] This is a dramatic

enactment of the Last Judgement on a human scale, the

General is called from his tomb still wrapped in his

burial shroud, by a small angel. The pyramid of Time

collapses above him while Time himself breaks his

scythe, and Death, toppling into the abyss, loses his

crown. It is possible that the subject was inspired

by Handel’s Messiah, first performed in London on 22

March 1743: [q]“The trumpet shall sound, and the dead

shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall all be

changed”.[uq][10]

[]At the beginning of the century most artists were

aware that England lagged behind the continent in10[]Whinney, p.445 n.39

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that there was still an absence of a centralised

organisation for artistic training; for the awarding

of prizes and holding of exhibitions. Previous

attempts to set up academies of the arts had met with

little success. Though artists had long recognised

the need for such an institution, many were reluctant

to submit to the type of strict regulation that was

found in France under the Academie. As has been said,

Sir Godfrey Kneller was involved with the setting up

of the first Academy in 1711, and William Hogarth

took over St Martin’s Lane Academy in 1735 which had

originally been set up by his father-in-law, Sir

James Thornhill in 1724. Under Hogarth’s direction

the academy was run on democratic lines and he also

held the view that it was inappropriate to uphold the

art of antiquity as the basis of a modern British

school of painting. This Academy did not however

provide a consistent schooling, or exhibition space.

[]However, in 1754 The Society for the Encouragement

of the Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (Society of

Arts) was founded, and there were three sculptor-

members: Sir Henry Cheere (1703-81); Roubiliac and

Joseph Wilton. In 1760 Hogarth and a group of fellow

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artists petitioned the Society to use the great room

in their spacious premises in the Strand for the

first true public exhibition ever held in England.

The show was so successful that he and other artists

formed an independent group known as the Society of

Artists of Great Britain who held an exhibition at

Spring Gardens the following year, and for several

years after that. In 1765 this group, which now

numbered over two hundred members, obtained a Royal

charter as The Incorporated Society of Artists in

Great Britain and continued to hold successful

exhibitions, but the viewing conditions were not

ideal and quarrels began to break out over the

hanging of the pictures. In the autumn of 1768 the

Society dissolved, but within a few weeks King George

III had been approached by a group of artists, led by

the architect Sir William Chambers, who asked if the

monarch, who saw himself as a cultivated man, would

agree to being the patron of a Royal Academy of Arts.

The King readily agreed to recognise the institution

as well as to make up for any financial deficit it

incurred out of the Privy Purse. The Royal Academy

was responsible for the holding of yearly

exhibitions, and students were admitted to the

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Academy Schools where, under the control of the

Keeper, they could study from the model and gain

instruction from any of the Academicians who were

appointed as Visitors. A library of books and

engravings was established for the use of the

members, and prizes were awarded at the annual dinner

which enabled many to travel abroad.

[]The foundation of the Academy was an important

event for the arts in England providing a much needed

impetus for the patronage of British artists, but as

far as sculpture has been concerned it has also been

seen as having led to a great deal of conformity of

style and absence of particular genius. One reason

for this perceived lack of individuality was that the

establishment of the Schools coincided with the rise

of Neoclassicism, an artistic style which was born

out of the growing taste for the past glories of Rome

and Greece. This taste greatly influenced the style

of funerary sculpture, especially as many antique

stone and marble sarcophagi had survived the

centuries, and were easily accessible in Italy.

Futhermore the discovery of intact funerary monuments

in the ash-buried towns of Herculaneum and Pompeii in

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1738 and 1748 respectively, excited and inspired many

sculptors. [SLIDE] [SLIDE][SLIDE]

[]However the new style was not immediately evident

and the work of the three sculptors: Joseph Wilton

(1722-1803); Agostino Carlini (?-1790); and William

Tyler (?-1801), who were among the 36 founder members

of the Academy, remained largely inspired by the

Rococo and Baroque. Of the three sculptors only

Wilton has had a lasting reputation and left behind a

large body of work.

[]Wilton is the creator of 8 monuments in the Abbey,

and these vary a great deal in size and form with

often a mixture of Baroque and Neoclassical elements.

Wilton’s most famous work here is the large Monument

to General Wolfe on which the sculptor worked for approx

6 years. [SLIDE] It was finally erected in 1772 and

reflects Roubiliac’s influence in its dramatic

presentation, but some elements are classical. In

insisting on showing the dying general in the nude,

Wilton wished to show off both his knowledge of

anatomy, as well as his intellect because the figure

may have been based on the antique theme of the dying

Meleager. The Renaissance architect and writer, Leon

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Battista Alberti recommended artists study an ancient

work found in Rome in which [q]“Meleager, a dead man,

weighs down those who carry him. In every one of his

members he appears completely dead...Anyone who tries

to express a dead body-which is certainly most

difficult-will be a good painter....”[uq][11] It is

not certain which work Alberti was referring to, it

probably was from an ancient sarcophagus. Of course

Wilton’s Wolfe is not yet dead, but the fingers of

his left arm, which is supported by a grenadier in

full uniform, hang down lifelessly. Wilton includes a

Baroque allegorical figure of Victory as well as the

naturalistic figure of a soldier whose upper body is

the only part of the figure which is in high relief,

the rest melts back into the marble background.

[]It was this type of attempt to produce a form of

perspective which Sir Joshua Reynolds, the first

President of the Royal Academy, was to attack in his

‘Discourse on Sculpture’ in 1780. As far as Reynolds

was concerned, sculpture was a limited, though much

admired, art and it is likely that his views were

generally accepted during the 18th century though the

sculptor John Flaxman, (whom we will come to later) a11[]Alberti, p.75

22


great admirer of Reynolds as an artist and also as a

public spokesman for the arts in Britain, later said

that [q]“Reynolds wrote admirably on painting but

occasionally nonsense about sculpture.”[uq][12]

Reynolds, whose own taste was for the antique as well

as the work of the Italian Renaissance artists,

especially Michelangelo, was not a great admirer of

the Baroque or the Rococo in sculpture. He insisted

that the [q] “grave and austere character of

sculpture requires utmost formality in

composition.”[13][uq] He also said that it was not

possible to add picturesque effects such as flying

draperies, because this would degrade the

intellectual grandeur of sculpture. He maintained

that it was not possible to change the boundaries set

by ancient works of sculpture because the creators of

these had achieved utmost perfection. That painting

could explore different effects made it a more

extensive and complicated art than sculpture. You may

have guessed that Reynolds himself was a painter not

a sculptor!

12[]Farington, vol. v, p.198013[]Reynolds, Discourses, p.233

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[]One of the sculptors who tended to follow antique

rather than contemporary patterns was Joseph

Nollekens (1737-1823) and this is probably why he was

commissioned by Reynolds to erect the Monument to Oliver

Goldsmith (c1730-1774), a writer and close friend of

Reynolds who had also been honorary Professor of

Ancient History for the RA from 1770 until his death.

[SLIDE] Although Reynolds had conveyed his distaste

for the overcrowding of the Abbey when he said that

[q] “it had more the air of a stone-cutter’s shop

than a Christian church”[uq] he also believed in the

importance of appropriate placement for memorials and

thus was determined to find a place in Poet’s Corner

for Goldsmith’s monument. [14] Reynolds himself went

to the Abbey to choose the position, and his pupil,

James Northcote later said that the artist was

pleased to have found [q]“so conspicuous a situation

for it”.[uq] [15]

[]The form and imagery of the memorial is appropriate

for an 18th-century man of letters in that it

comprises elements reflecting the spirit of the age

of Enlightenment. It contains a bas-relief medallion

14[]Whitley, vol II, p.25615[]Reynolds, Portraits, p.53

24


portrait of Goldsmith based on a portrait painted by

Reynolds two years before the poet died. The use of

the profile adds status to the deceased by the

connotation of coinage, but it also alludes to the

ancient Roman custom in which the busts of

illustrious men were set on shields and hung up for

display in public. These shields were called ‘imago

clipeata’ and the custom was described by the writer,

Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23-79), an important source for

18th century intellectuals studying the culture of

ancient Rome. Under the medallion are the sculpted

attributes of the dramatist and poet: books and a

player’s mask as well as the laurel wreath with which

the busts of great poets were crowned in ancient

times.

[]Although the calm simplicity of the work and the

reference to Antique sources reflects the

Neoclassical style, Nollekens was not generally a

Neoclassical sculptor, he tended rather to follow

fashions set by sculptors such as Rysbrack. However

his contemporary, and fellow royal Academician Thomas

Banks, (1735-1805), was regarded by his colleagues

and successors as the first true English

25


Neoclassicist. Reynolds considered him to be[q]“ the

first of our country who has produced any thing like

classic Sculpture in England.”[uq][16] But his most

renowned monument today is seen as being a profoundly

Romantic work despite its Neoclassical handling. This

monument is not in Westminster Abbey but I wanted to

show it to you because it caused such a stir when it

was shown at the Royal Academy exhibition in 1793.

[SLIDE] Many of those who saw it, including Queen

Charlotte and her daughters, wept openly. This

monument was commissioned from Banks by Sir Boothby

Brooke to commemorate his daughter, Penelope, who had

died as a small child. It was erected in the family’s

parish church at Ashbourne in Derbyshire. Until this

monument was exhibited Boothby himself was best known

as the translator of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-

1778), the French philosopher and political writer.

Rousseau’s book Emile (1762) was probably the most

important text the Enlightenment produced on the

education of children, with its special emphasis on

[q] “seeing, thinking, and feeling”. [uq][17] The form

of the Monument to Penelope Boothby was obviously

16[]Smith quoted in Church Memorials of Thomas Banks in ChurchMonuments vol I p.4917[]Children and Civic Education in The Portable EnlightenmentReader, p.229

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influenced by Boothby himself and in its intention to

reach the heart as well as the mind of visitors to

the church it reflects the essence of the cult of

sensibility which was one of the elements of the

Enlightenment. It is also very Neoclassical in its

use of details such as the decorative fluting on the

sarcophagus and the very highly polished handling.

[]Of the 28 church memorials produced by Banks, 5

were commissioned for Westminster Abbey. Flaxman

later praised Banks for his [q]“regular architectural

decoration of the wall; by which means, together with

the excellence of the work, the church becomes a

museum of sacred sculpture”. [18] Of Banks’s work in

the Abbey the most interesting is the Monument to Sir

Eyre Coote (1783) Commander-in-chief of British Forces

in India. It includes one of Banks’s most stunning

images, a naked mourning Mahratta captive which was

highly praised by The European Magazine as [q] “the most

original, as well as the finest sepulchral statue of

modern, or, perhaps of any times”. [uq][19]

Unfortunately I have not got a slide of this monument

but it has been suggested that this figure

18[]Mem of TB in Church Mons, p.5019[]Church Mons p.54

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anticipates Rodin’s The Thinker. Of Banks’s other

monuments, I have chosen to show you his first: the

Monument to Isaac Watts which was erected in 1779; as

well as a later work - the Monument to William Woollett

(1735-85), an engraver who had studied at the St

Martin’s Lane Academy. Woollett had had his greatest

success with the engraving of The Death of Wolfe after

Benjamin West’s painting of 1771 in which the painter

had broken with conventions of neoclassicism by

depicting his figures in contemporary dress, causing

something of a revolution in taste; and Woollett was

also the first English engraver whose work had a

considerable market on the Continent.

[]The Monument to Isaac Watts (1674-1748) the great hymn

writer, is a wall tablet consisting of a traditional

bust on a plinth with two mourning boys who resemble

those carved by Rysbrack for the Prior monument in

Poet’s Corner. [SLIDE] They lean on their down turned

torches either side of the bust. Beneath this is a

circular relief instead of the more usual wordy

epitaph, which represents an obviously female muse

guiding the hand of the minister as he sits at his

desk.

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[]The Monument to Woollett erected in 1791 also contains

a bust and bas-relief of an allegory representing

[q]“The Genius of Engraving Handing Down to Posterity

the Works of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture:

whilst Fame is Distributing them over the Four

Quarters of the Globe” [uq]. Again the epitaph is

visual. The reference on both of these monuments to

the earthly accomplishments of the men suggests the

18th century notion that afterlife lies in artistic

achievement rather than in the memory of those who

mourn, and that the preservation of identity and of

the achievements which identify and thus

individualise the deceased for posterity was very

important. Banks’s prominent signature under the

allegory on the Woollett memorial also turns it into

a work of art rather than just a commemorative

tablet. His allegory praises the engraver for

perpetuating the work of artists, sculptors, and

architects but for Banks it might be said that the

memorial to Woollett is also self-perpetuating.

[SLIDE]

[]The Royal Academy’s creation of the Chair of

Sculpture in 1810 was probably in recognition of John

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Flaxman’s (1755-1826) achievements in this art, but

he was also greatly admired for his illustrations of

works such as Homer’s Illiad, and Dante’s Divine Comedy.

During his lifetime he achieved international acclaim

with his illustrations, but in England he was, and

probably still is, the most well known of all

sculptors. Despite this in Westminster Abbey he is

represented by only four monuments.

[]It is possible that the reason why there are so few

of Flaxman’s monuments in Westminster Abbey ( and he

laid claim to 108 works in this genre) was simply due

to the lack of available space at this time, and that

permission had finally been granted for the erection

of statuary in St Paul’s Cathedral by the Bishop of

London in 1787. The end of the century also saw the

outbreak of hostilities between England and France

and Spain which not only increased the numbers of

military and naval casualties, but also occasioned a

great outpouring of national pride. As has been said,

the Government responded to this by voting a large

sum of money for the erection of monuments to honour

the memory of men who had given their lives in

battle. This sum of money was to be managed by a

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committee who would choose the sculptors and approve

designs. Originally the committee was elected by the

Royal Academy in 1791, but charges of favouritism

were made, and the government appointed a new

committee which did not include any Royal

Academicians, or artists but rather connoisseurs and

collectors and hence it became known as the Committee

of Taste. Between 1798 and 1819 over £110,000 was

distributed among 13 sculptors for the erection of 35

monuments, 4 of which went into Westminster Abbey and

the remainder in St Paul’s. Most of them were erected

to men whose names are generally no longer

remembered, but the most important of them was

undoubtedly the one which was erected to Admiral Lord

Horatio Nelson commissioned from John Flaxman in

1807. [SLIDE]

[]When Nelson was killed in action at the battle of

Trafalgar in 1805 his death was regarded as a public

tragedy, and the decision to commission Flaxman to

sculpt his monument which was to be erected in a very

public arena is an indication of how esteemed the

sculptor was. Like his other monuments which

commemorate heroes of the period, Flaxman’s Nelson is

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classically stoic rather than romantically human. The

aloof figure of the admiral stares out over the heads

of the ordinary people who had followed the

magnificent state funeral when the dead hero was

taken to Greenwich, where his body had lain in state

for 4 days, before being borne on a funeral barge

down the Thames to St Paul’s. After his burial, the

car on which his coffin had lain was left on display

in the cathedral because so many sightseers wanted to

see it. Apparently the officials of Westminster Abbey

became so concerned about the desertion of visitors

that a waxwork figure of Nelson, dressed in clothes

he had supposedly worn, was set up in the Abbey and

enticed the crowds back successfully.

[]Although the epitaph on Flaxman’s monument pays

tribute to Nelson’s “moment of victory” and “glorious

death”, the only aspect of emotion in the sculptor’s

composition is to be found in the two children,

possibly young seamen, who stand at the base of the

monument. They are placed so that they are forced to

lean backwards so as to get a glimpse of the great

man, and this human element brings some warmth to the

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work, as well as a hint of the immense feeling felt

by the people of the nation for this hero.

[]At the same time that Flaxman was at work on the

Nelson, he was also working on a commemorative statue

of Sir Joshua Reynolds to stand under the dome of the

cathedral opposite the statue of Dr Samuel Johnson (-

1784). The Johnson had been commissioned from John

Bacon (1740-1799) in 1787 by Reynolds and was finally

erected in 1796 four years after Reynolds’s death.

This larger than life-size statue depicted Johnson as

a philosopher, in the antique style, dressed in a

toga. This did not impress the critics who believed

that Johnson did not suit such attire. [SLIDE]

Bacons’ statue of the philanthropist and prison

reformer, John Howard, which was erected at the same

time, was also dismissed. [SLIDE] Flaxman did not

make the same mistake as his colleague, he chose to

depict Reynolds in contemporary dress, draped in his

doctoral robes which manage to connote the antique

rather than resorting to the overtly antique by using

the increasingly incongruous toga. [SLIDE]

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[]Although the foundation of the Royal Academy in

1768 ensured that British artists experienced an

increase in patronage and thus status, the art of

sculpture tended to be seen as a limited art which

had already achieved perfection with the Ancient

sculptors of Greece and Rome, and this may be why

sculptor-members of the Academy were under-

represented in comparison with the painters. The

perceived limitation of sculpture, plus the increased

taste for Neoclassicism led to a greater conformity

of style which is apparent in the design of the

commemorative monuments in St Paul’s Cathedral in

contrast with the monuments of Westminster Abbey in

the first half of the 18th century. Taken as a whole,

however, the commemorative sculpture of the 18th

century reflects the wide range of artistic styles

running throughout the century and beyond, as well as

the ideals promulgated by the spirit of the

Enlightenment. The sudden filling up of Westminster

Abbey, followed by St Paul’s was one of the effects

of the individualism which was at the seat of the

Enlightenment, as was the move to celebrate the life

and achievements of eminent Englishmen:

intellectuals, scientists, dramatists, artists and

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poets as well the desire to pay tribute to the heroic

patriotism of men of action.

35

Documents

Westminster Abbey or Glorious Victory