Lot 174: AN ENGLISH MARBLE FIGURE OF 'A PEASANT BOY FEEDING A RABBIT'

AN ENGLISH MARBLE FIGURE OF 'A PEASANT BOY FEEDING A RABBIT' BY JOSEPH GOTT (1785-1860), ROME, MID-19TH CENTURY Signed 'J. GOTT. F.T' 46 ½ in. (118 cm.) high; 17 ½ in. (44.5 cm.) wide; 10 in. (25.5 cm.) deep

(118 cm.) high; 17 ½ in. (44.5 cm.) wide; 10 in. (25.5 cm.) deep

19TH CENTURY

'Joseph Gott Sculptor', Exhibition Catalogue, Temple Newsam House, Leeds and the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, 1972, G.114., p.52.

‘The boy is feeding a rabbit, and nothing can exceed the graceful simplicity of his attitude and the exquisite beauty of the entire form’ The Carlisle Journal, 23 November 1833. In a letter from Joseph Gott to his distant cousin and patron, William Gott, in 1832, the first version of A Peasant Boy feeding a Rabbit is mentioned as having been in progress since 1827. In 1833 it was exhibited - almost certainly along with a pendant figure entitled Little Red Riding Hood - at the Carlisle Academy of Fine Arts, where it was purchased by Richard Vaughan Yates, a wealthy Liverpool iron merchant and important patron of Victorian 'ideal' sculpture. The marble was later acquired - either through sale or inheritance - by a Colonel Belcher, and was presented by the latter to the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, in 1916. Sadly, it was then destroyed during the Second World War. It was the practice of 19th century sculptors to make more than one example of their most famous works. However the version of A Peasant Boy feeding a Rabbit formerly at the Walker Art Gallery was thought to have been the only version. That it was sadly lost makes the existence of the present lot, a hereto unknown second version, an all the more exciting discovery. Born in Yorkshire in 1876, Joseph Gott was apprenticed to Sir John Flaxman from 1798 to 1802. He joined the Royal Academy Schools in 1805 and won various medals and awards. In 1822, sponsored by his patron, the President of the Royal Academy Sir Thomas Lawrence, he travelled to Rome and, apart from visits home, settled there for the rest of his life. Gott was a contemporary of John Gibson and Richard James-Wyatt and together they formed the nucleus of a vibrant school of British sculptors working in Rome. Rather than the austere neo-classicism of many of his contemporaries, he adopted a sweeter, more romantic style. Although he did execute sculpture on a monumental scale, his most effective work was in small-scale terracotta and marble groups, and he was particularly successful with groups of dogs and children. His close observation of behaviour and anatomy was transferred into the sculptures with great sensitivity and realism.