Lot 324: John Michael Rysbrack (Antwerp 1694-1770 London)

John Michael Rysbrack (Antwerp 1694-1770 London)
Study for a statue of John Locke
traces of black chalk, pen and black ink, brown wash, heightened with white
6 3/8 x 2¾ in. (161 x 70 mm.); and Dutch School, 17th Century, Studies after reliefs on two classical sarcophagi; Flemish School, 17th Century, A putto on a pedestal; French School, 18th Century, after Bernini, A study of a sculpture of a saint (recto); Study for a ceiling design (verso); and Italian School, 17th Century, The personification of Abundance (5)

M.I. Webb, Michael Rysbrack Sculptor, London, 1954. pp. 169-70.
J. Harris, Catalogue of British Drawings for Architecture, Decoration, Sculpture and Landscape Gardening 1550-1900 in American Collections, Upper Saddle River, 1971, p. 200, no. 2, pl. 148 (1).

J. Harris first suggested that the Rysbrack sketch was for his statue of the great philospher John Locke at Christ Church, Oxford in a letter to Professor Held dated 29 April 1964. The statue was made between 1754-58, and there is a version in terracotta at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. In his 1971 publication Harris noted a sheet of three studies for the statue in the Art Institute of Chicago (J. Harris, p. 200, no. 1).