An Angel Raising up a Young Girl (Ada Beer),” by Henry Hugh Armstead (1828-1905). c.1878. Carrarra marble. The Beer Mausoleum, Highgate (Western) Cemetery, Swain's Lane, Highgate, London N6.
The centrepiece of Julius Beer's unusual and impressive family mausoleum, located high up in a key position in the Western Cemetery, is a moving relief by Armstead showing a little girl being raised up” by an angel. The child represented here was Beer's daughter Ada, who had died in 1875 at the age of eight. This sculptor's work is often seen as heralding the New Sculpture, and this is a lovely example of his graceful style and evocative touch. A sketch for the monument in the Royal Academy suggests that at first he had the child's mother in mind as a model for the angel ("Henry Hugh Armstead").
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Photograph by Robert Freidus, reproduced here by kind permission of Highgate Cemetery. Text and formatting by
Bibliography
Barker, Felix. Highgate Cemetery: Victorian Valhalla. Salem, N.H. (by arrangement with John Murray): Salem House, 1984. Print.
"Beer Mausoleum." The Mausolea & Monuments Trust. Web. 21 August 2013.
Cherry, Bridget, and Nikolaus Pevsner. London 4: North. Buildings of England series. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2002. Print.
Curl, James Stevens. The Victorian Celebration of Death. Paperback ed. Stroud: Sutton, 2004. Print.
"Henry Hugh Armstead, R.A. 1828-1905." Royal Academy of Arts Collections. Web. 21 August 2013.
"Mausoleum of Julius Beer in Highgate (Western) Cemetery, Camden." British Listed Buildings. Web. 21 August 2013.
Content last modified 21 August 2013
Reformatted 16 March 2015