Harry Bates A.R.A. English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 sculptor

Sculpture

Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...

, was born in Stevenage

Stevenage

Stevenage is a town and borough in Hertfordshire, England. It is situated to the east of junctions 7 and 8 of the A1, and is between Letchworth Garden City to the north, and Welwyn Garden City to the south....

, Hertfordshire

Hertfordshire

Hertfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England. The county town is Hertford.The county is one of the Home Counties and lies inland, bordered by Greater London , Buckinghamshire , Bedfordshire , Cambridgeshire and...

. Bates was elected to the Royal Academy in 1892 as A.R.A. and was an active, if intermittent, member of the Art Workers Guild. He was a central figure in the British movement known as the New Sculpture

New Sculpture

The New Sculpture refers to a movement in late 19th-century British sculpture.The term "New Sculpture" was coined by the first historian of the movement, the critic Edmund Gosse, who wrote a four-part series for the Art Journal in 1894...

. He began his career as a carver's assistant, and before beginning the regular study of plastic art he passed through a long apprenticeship in architectural

Architecture

Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...

 decoration working for the firm of Farmer & Brindley

Farmer & Brindley

Farmer & Brindley was a firm of architectural sculptors and ornamentalists based in London, founded by William Farmer and William Brindley , who contributed to some of the greatest structures of the Victorian era....

.

In 1879 he came to London and entered the South London School of Technical Art (formerly known as Lambeth School of Art

Lambeth School of Art

Lambeth School of Art was founded in 1854 by William Gregory as a night school associated with the St. Mary the Less Church in London.-History:...

, now the City and Guilds of London Art School

City and Guilds of London Art School

The City and Guilds of London Art School is an art college in London, England, United Kingdom. It is one of the country's longest established art colleges, and offers courses ranging from Foundation, through B.A. degree, Postgraduate Diploma and M.A...

). There he studyed under Jules Dalou

Jules Dalou

Aimé-Jules Dalou was a French sculptor, recognized as one of the most brilliant virtuosos of nineteenth-century France, admired for his perceptiveness, execution, and unpretentious realism.-Life:...

 and winning a silver medal in the national competition at South Kensington

South Kensington

South Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London. It is a built-up area located 2.4 miles west south-west of Charing Cross....

. In 1881 he was admitted to the Royal Academy schools, where in 1883 he won the gold medal and the travelling scholarship with his relief of Socrates

Socrates

Socrates was a classical Greek Athenian philosopher. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known chiefly through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon, and the plays of his contemporary ...

 teaching the People in the Agora, which showed grace of line and harmony of composition. He then went to Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, where he took up an independent studio (on Dalou's suggestion). He was influenced by Rodin, who advised him on occasion about his work. A head and three small bronze panels (the Aeneid

Aeneid

The Aeneid is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. It is composed of roughly 10,000 lines in dactylic hexameter...

,) executed by Bates in Paris, were exhibited at the Royal Academy

Royal Academy

The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...

, and selected for purchase by the Chantrey Bequest trustees; but the selection had to be cancelled because they had not been modelled in England.

His Aeneas

Aeneas

Aeneas , in Greco-Roman mythology, was a Trojan hero, the son of the prince Anchises and the goddess Aphrodite. His father was the second cousin of King Priam of Troy, making Aeneas Priam's second cousin, once removed. The journey of Aeneas from Troy , which led to the founding a hamlet south of...

(1885), Homer

Homer

In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...

(1886), three Psyche panels and Rhodope

Rhodope

Rhodope may mean:* Queen Rhodope, a figure of Greek mythology* Rhodope Mountains, in Bulgaria and Greece* Rhodope Prefecture, of Greece* Rhodope * 166 Rhodope, an asteroid...

 (1887), all showed marked advance in form and dignity. Bates's primary skill lay in the composition and sculpting of relief sculpture, and it is in this medium that he achieved his most technically and aesthetically refined work. The freestanding ideal sculpture remained the most important of sculptural genres, however, and Bates gradually turned to statues such as the 1889 Hounds in Leash, which is essentially a relief composition translated to three dimensions. In this work, Bates demonstrated his ability to convey muscular intensity and movement and led to his greater success and ambition. His next major statue, the 1890 Pandora

Pandora

In Greek mythology, Pandora was the first woman. As Hesiod related it, each god helped create her by giving her unique gifts...

, is more truly a figure in the round, and in this work Bates experimented with polychromy and mixed materials, making it self-consciously into a paradigmatic example of his artistic priorities. The box she holds is an actual decorative casket made of ivory and gilt bronze and elaborately carved with scenes from the Pandora legend. It was exhibited in 1890 at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition and purchased within the following year for the Chantrey Bequest. The portrait-busts of Harry Bates are good pieces of realism: strong, yet delicate in technique, and excellent in character. His statues have a picturesqueness in which the refinement of the sculptor is always felt. Among the chief of these are the fanciful Maharaja of Mysore

Kingdom of Mysore

The Kingdom of Mysore was a kingdom of southern India, traditionally believed to have been founded in 1399 in the vicinity of the modern city of Mysore. The kingdom, which was ruled by the Wodeyar family, initially served as a vassal state of the Vijayanagara Empire...

, somewhat overladen with ornament, and the colossal equestrian statue of Lord Roberts

Frederick Roberts, 1st Earl Roberts

Field Marshal Frederick Sleigh Roberts, 1st Earl Roberts, Bt, VC, KG, KP, GCB, OM, GCSI, GCIE, KStJ, PC was a distinguished Indian born British soldier who regarded himself as Anglo-Irish and one of the most successful British commanders of the 19th century.-Early life:Born at Cawnpore, India, on...

(1896) upon its important pedestal, girdled with a frieze of figures, now set up in Calcutta, and a statue of Queen Victoria

Victoria of the United Kingdom

Victoria was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she used the additional title of Empress of India....

 for Dundee

Dundee

Dundee is the fourth-largest city in Scotland and the 39th most populous settlement in the United Kingdom. It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firth of Tay, which feeds into the North Sea...

. But perhaps his masterpiece—in which his interest in polychromy and mixed materials in a format that fused decorative art and sculpture achieved its fullest realization—was an allegorical presentment of Love and Life, a winged male figure in bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

, with a female figure in ivory being crowned by the male.

Bates died in London on 30 January 1899, his premature death robbing English plastic art of its most promising representative at the time. He is primarily remembered as one of the most important sculptors working with the traditions of the decorative arts within the New Sculpture

New Sculpture

The New Sculpture refers to a movement in late 19th-century British sculpture.The term "New Sculpture" was coined by the first historian of the movement, the critic Edmund Gosse, who wrote a four-part series for the Art Journal in 1894...

 movement. Both through his innovative use of polychromy and his allusive subject matter, he is often understood to be one of primary representatives of international Symbolism within British sculpture.

External links

• The Victorian Web
• Tate Britain: rare Victorian sculpture - set by ketrin1407 on Flickr
  Flickr
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  featuring numerous views of Bates' Pandora among others