Penserosa. John Hancock (1824-69). Plaster maquette; 27 inches (68.5 cm) high. Collection of the Guildhall Art Gallery, Corporation of London. Accession no. 140. Image kindly provided by the author (not to be reproduced). The marble statue itself is 73¼ inches (186 cm) high, and is in the collection of Mansion House, the Corporation of London.
One of Hancock's most important commissions was in 1861 for the statue of Penserosa for the Egyptian Hall of the Mansion House, London. The Mansion House is the official residence of the Lord Mayor of London, built in the Palladian style, largely in the 1740s, and designed by the architect George Dance. The main reception room was known as the "Egyptian Hall," so-called because the columns that supported it were deemed to be in the Egyptian style, although no other Egyptian motifs were incorporated into the design. The room held twenty niches to hold sculptures.
Between the years 1853 and 1861 the Corporation of London commissioned a series of marble sculptures for display in the Egyptian Hall from fourteen sculptors, including Hancock. Similar to the earlier Westminster Hall competitions held from 1844-47 for the Palace of Westminster, the subjects had to be taken from British history or literature. Each successful sculptor was to be paid £70 for his or her work. In the competition announced in 1862 the terms of arrangement stated that three of the statues were to be male figures and two were to be female. Hancock's statue of Penserosa was based on John Milton's poem "Il Penseroso," making the subject a highly appropriate one. Other sculptors chosen over the years by the Corporation of London included such well-known names as Susan Durant, John Henry Foley, J. S. Westmacott, E. W. Wyon, and Henry Weekes. Entrants were required to submit plaster models to the selection committee and Hancock submitted his maquette in 1861. This maquette is now in the Guildhall Art Gallery of the Corporation of London. Hancock completed his full-size marble sculpture by the middle of 1862 and the statue was installed in the Egyptian Hall in January 1863. A reduced copy of the statuette in marble was shown at the British Institution in 1863, no. 611. This is possibly the small marble version of c.1862, 22 inches (56cm) high, that sold at Sotheby's, London, on May 12, 1995, lot 170. This version was identical in its composition to the plaster maquette. A full-size version was shown at the Royal Academy in 1864, no. 899. In the catalogue for this exhibition was written "Executed in marble for the Egyptian Hall, Mansion House."
When the reduced copy of Penserosa was shown at the British Institution in 1863 the reviewer for The Illustrated London News singled it out for praise: "Among the few works in sculpture the following deserve special notice…A reduced copy, by Mr. Hancock, of his colossal Penserosa just erected in the Egyptian Hall of the Mansion House" (206). When a full-size sculpture of Penserosa was shown at the Royal Academy in 1864 a critic for The Art Journal found the sculptures displayed that year not to be particularly distinguished. He felt, however, that Hancock's contribution was one of the better ones, despite his not liking how Hancock had carved the drapery: "Each of the styles, however, whereby the art of sculpture is distinguished has a few solitary, if not very signal examples, which we shall pass in cursory review. The school that seeks to cast poetry into plaster, or aspires to carve beauty in marble, is upheld by J. Hancock's Penserosa, a figure poetic and in conception consonant with Milton's words:
Come, pensive nun devote and pure,
Sober, steadfast, and demure.
The artist, however, will do well to revise his drapery, which at present, in its too decisive folds, militates against the force of the head" (168). The critic's comment about "decisive drapery" confirms this having been a full-length cast rather than one based on the maquette where the drapery is much looser. The comments written in the 1864 catalogue for the Royal Academy exhibition "executed in marble for the Egyptian Hall, Mansion House" suggest this could be the actual work for the Mansion House, but this would be surprising because the sculpture had only recently been installed there in 1863.
When one compares the maquette to the finished sculpture for Penserosa minor differences are apparent. The downward tilt of the head is not so pronounced in the finished work and the flowers around her head are more clearly defined. Her facial features and her hands and feet, as well as her drapery, are much crisper and more clearly defined in the finished work. The principal version, along with his earlier Beatrice, are definitely Hancock's most important "Ideal" sculptures.
The full-length version of Penserosa was not the first work that Hancock had completed on this subject. In 1857 Hancock had produced a plaster bust of Penserosa that was purchased by Prince Albert and given to Queen Victoria as a Christmas present. It is currently in the Royal Collection at Osborne House. In 1858 Hancock exhibited a bust of this subject in terra-cotta at the Royal Academy, no. 1268, and in 1862 a marble version, no. 1053. Although the Royal Academy catalogue from 1862 lists this as a "marble statue", a review in The Art Journal definitely identifies it as a bust (138).
Bibliography
"Art in the City." The Art Journal New Series VII (March 1, 1861): 127.
Bryant, Julius. Magnificent Marble Statues: British Sculpture in the Mansion House. London: Paul Holberton, 2013. 92-95.
"Fine Arts. The British Institution." The Illustrated London News XLII (February 21, 1863): 206.
Greenwood, Martin. "Penserosa." In Benedict Read and Joanna Barnes Eds. Pre-Raphaelite Sculpture: Nature and Imagination in British Sculpture, 1848-1914. London: Lund Humphries, 1991, cat. 18. 108.
Read, Benedict. Victorian Sculpture. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1982. 206.
"The Royal Academy." The Art Journal New Series I (June 1, 1862): 138.
"The Royal Academy." The Art Journal New series III (June 1, 1864): 157-68.
"Sculpture from the Mansion House." The Art Journal New Series II (July 1, 1863): 147.
Created 26 April 2024