“Sleeping Shepherd Boy” by John Gibson, RA 1790-l866

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Sleeping Shepherd Boy

John Gibson, RA 1790-l866

1818

Plaster

Sculpture shelf on the Sackler Wing Landing, Royal Academy, London

li>Close-up of face

View from another angle

Photograph and text Jacqueline Banerjee, 2010

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This was "the first life-size figure modelled by Gibson in Rome as a pupil" ("The Sleeping Shepherd Boy"); The London Literary Gazette and Journal of Belles Lettres, Arts, Sciences considered it to be "conceived with great taste, and executed with equal skill; but a shepherd — man or boy — ought to be watchful" (qtd. in "The Sleeping Shepherd Boy"). One might not have expected such a cavil at a time of nostalgia for the slower pace of rural life. But no doubt this pastoral workt was more wholeheartedly appreciated in some quarters: when it was commissioned in marble for Lord Prudhoe, later to become the 4th Duke of Northumberland, the work was entitled simply "Repose." The abstract title seems appropriate. As a modern commentator writes, "In the sweetness of his expression and the detailed depiction of the hair and lamb's fleece covering the tree stump, this portrayal of an anonymous shepherd boy is close in style to a genre piece" ("Artwork of the Month").

Bibliography

"The Sleeping Shepherd Boy" (an Art Fund site). Web. Viewed 27 June 2010.

"Artwork of the Month — May 2007" (a Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, site). Web. Viewed 27 June 2010.

Last modified 28 July 2010