Demosthenes after Cheere
A monumental Enoch
Wood pearlware figure of Demosthenes, circa 1790-1810.
Height 48.3 cms.
Bonhams, saleroom, London, Lot 260, 18 June 2024.
The Athenian orator, his papers and a quill resting on a pedestal to his left
painted to simulate marble, with a relief panel depicting Hermes above a
smaller figure of Demosthenes on a cliffside overlooking ships at sea, the base
picked out in cobalt blue, 48.3cm high
Footnotes:
A similar figure with impressed mark 'E Wood' was sold by Bonhams on 20 October 2009, lot 122. Another marked example from the Glaisher Bequest is in the Fitzwilliam Museum (inv. no.C.900-1928), where it is noted that the figure had been previously identified as St Paul and also as Eloquence.
However, the model would appear to
be after a plaster figure of Demosthenes by John Cheere. See Pat Halfpenny,
English Earthenware Figures 1740-1840 (1991), pp.159-62 for further discussion
of the source of this impressive model.
For further
information on this lot please visit Bonhams.com
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Demosthenes.
Victoria and Albert Museum.
Height 48.2 cms.
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O230553/demosthenes-figure-wood-enoch/
The figure represents
the Athenian orator Demosthenes (324-322 BC). The relief on the side of the
plinth shows Hermes, messenger of the gods, who was associated with eloquence
and reasoning, and this feature therefore also alludes to Demosthenes' oratorial
skill.
The attribution to Enoch Wood's factory is based on similar figure with the mark 'E WOOD' in the Fitzwilliam Museum Glaisher Bequest(inventory number C.900-1928). The V&A figure differs from the Fitwilliam example in that scroll does not overhang the plinth. The figure derives from a full-size plaster statue made in the 1750s in the London workshop of John Cheere, who later sold reduced sized casts of it.
Wood could
have obtained his cast from Charles Harris (died 1795), the owner of another
London plaster shop. Harris's catalogue of about 1790 lists a model of
Demosthenes, as well as several other subjects manufactured by Wood.
Charles Harris of the Strand (d. c. 1795) there is an undated 'Catalogue of Statues, Bass Reliefs, Bustos, & c.' (V. & A., National Art Library 1.37.Y) which includes a figure of Demosthenes of the same size for 2 guineas, and figures of Prudence and Fortitude which might have been the models for Wood's figures of those subjects.
A
somewhat similar figure is shown representing 'Education' in George Bickham's
'The Universal Penman', London, 1743.
For the Charles Harris Catalogue and more on Harris see my blog post -
http://english18thcenturyportraitsculpture.blogspot.com/2016/01/charles-harris-catalogue.html
Another version in the V and A.
........................
Demosthenes.
The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.
Height 48.2 cms.
https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/76326
The mark E. WOOD suggests that the figure was probably made between 1783 when Enoch Wood (1739-1840) was potting on his own, probably at the Over House Works in Burslem, and 1793 when he opened a new factory at Fountain Place, and entered into a formal partnership with James Caldwell which lasted until 1818.
However, it is possible that the mark E. WOOD continued to be used after the partnership was formed and the WOOD & CALDWELL mark was introduced.
Wood's partnership
with his cousin Ralph Wood in 1784 lasted for only a few weeks.
.....................
Demosthenes.
47.4 cms.
Cleveland Museum of
Arts.
This item is in the
Burton Constable Hall collections and is included on this database by kind
permission of the Burton Constable Foundation. John Cheere was possibly the
first sculptor to popularise the art of ‘bronzing’ plaster figures in an
attempt to imitate the translucent quality of bronze.
In their seminal work
on John Cheere, Terry Friedman and Timothy Clifford present an account of the
‘bronzing’ technique:there are two sorts of compositions used for this purpose,
the red and the yellow; the latter is made of the finest copper dust, and to
the former is added a small quantity of red ochre, well pulverized. Both are
applied with a varnish, and the work is dried over a chasing-dish as soon as
bronzed. Located in the Great Hall.
The Burton Constable Plaster Figure of Demosthenes by Cheere.
As part of the overall decorative scheme, William Constable acquired the plaster figures of Demosthenes and Hercules with Cerebus for the niches on either side of the fireplace.
These, and the plaster busts of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and the Greek poetess Sappho on the overmantel, are amongst a number of works supplied by the sculptor John Cheere (1709-87), who had initially submitted a series of sketches.
Unusually, the sketches also survive at Burton Constable.
The life-size plaster
figures of Flora and Livia Augusta are also by John Cheere and were
supplied in 1765 at 10 guineas apiece. Cheere also the statuettes of Hercules,
Demosthenes and Flora in the Staircase Hall.
............................
From the Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, XXXVIII.
1955
Available on line - https://archive.org/details/YAJ0381955
Letters in the Grimston Correspondence -
From John Cheere to John Grimston (1725 - 1780) of Kilnwick Hall. East Riding of Yorkshire
There is also interesting correspondence from his brother the sculptor Henry Cheere referring to (4) chimney pieces for Kilnwick and the monument in Kilnwich Church to his father Thomas Grimston who died in 1752, and a letter from John Smith, assistant to Henry Cheere regarding installation of the monument
https://archive.org/details/YAJ0381955/page/2/mode/2up
Hyde Park
Sir,
It gave me great uneasiness my not sending the two Statues sooner for fear if you had not more than common good nature & Patience I shou’d have quite disoblidg’d You, but I hope that you will be so good as not to take it ill for I never had so much trouble to get any finish t as I had these.
For being out of a new mold from your moddle it is more difficult & I cast three of each which did not prove so white as I coud wish for, but ye fourth prov’d quite white & I finisht them very neat & have sent them to ye waggon which I hope will please.
I beg Sir that they may be unpackt carefull. I have sent ye Names of several other Statues of ye same size. If You shoud want any more & you may depend of having them sent in less than a Month after they are order’d.
I do assure
You Sir that
ye two I sent
is well done
& am
Servant.
Statues ye
same size.
Homer, Virgil, Horace, Demosthenes, Socrates, Shakespear, Chaucer, Milton, Dryden, Spencer,
Locke, Newton, Tillotson, Boyle.
At least one of Cheere’s statues is still in situ. This was made for ‘The nitch in my Stair’ in the house built by Henry Maister in the High Street of Kingston-upon-Hull. Cheere had advised (an antique) Flora rather than a Venus as
‘He saies it will fill it (the niche) better, & the attitude not so liable to (be) broke’. ‘In this’ (says Maister) ‘he is right considering the danger she must daily be subject to’. The statue which occupies the staircase niche is actually a Ceres, since she holds in her hand a wreath of wheat ears. It is undoubtedly this figure which is referred to in the letter, although there is no indication as to why the substitution was made.
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