LondonTown.com: Historic sculpture exhibition in London next year


Released on: December 09, 2014, 11:34 am (EST)
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Industry: Travel

Tate Britain showcases remarkable Victorian sculptures in landmark exhibition in 2015.

LONDON, December 08, 2014 -- /EPR NETWORK/ -- London's Tate Britain has announced a major exhibition devoted to the innovative and compelling sculpture produced during Queen Victoria's reign (1837-1901). Sculpture Victorious will show how sculpture featured in all aspects of Victorian life, including politics, empire and industry, and includes major Victorian sculptors like Francis Chantrey and Alfred Gilbert, alongside lesser-known artists such as Mary Watts and William Reynolds-Stephens. The exhibition opens on 25th February 2015 and will continue until 25th May. The Tate Britain is one of London's most popular art galleries, covering the history of British art and containing some of the world's most important paintings. For more about this and other galleries in London, see LondonTown.com, where you will also find the best deals for cheap hotels in London.

The Victorian period was a Golden Age for British sculpture. The country had a monarch who commissioned and encouraged sculptors, and the state commissioned a range of sculpture and decoration to ornament the new Houses of Parliament. The grand public events, most famously The Great Exhibition of 1851, provided spectacular opportunities to showcase these productions, and demonstrate new developments in the carving of traditional materials such as wood or marble.

Throughout the period sculptors allied technical novelty to iconographic innovation, finding new subjects and compositions inspired by antiquity and the nation's past to create works that would have startled their predecessors. These works still have the capacity to surprise us today. George Frampton's life-size Dame Alice Owen 1897 in marble, alabaster, bronze, paint and gilding will be shown alongside finely-wrought silver and exquisitely-detailed electrotypes, such as James Sherwood Westmacott's electroplated Baron Saher de Quincy, Earl of Winchester in 1854. The latter has been removed from the House of Lords for the very first time for this exhibition. Other significant loans include George Gilbert Scott's model for the tomb of Philippa of Hainault in Westminster Abbey (1850-1), and Rafaelle Monti's breathtaking Veiled Vestal. Frederic Leighton's An Athlete Wrestling with a Python 1877, Sir Hamo Thornycroft's Teucer 1881 and Hylas Surprised by the Naiades exh.1837 by John Gibson from Tate's collection are also included. For more information on the exhibition, see LondonTown.com.

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