|
Louis-François Roubiliac (more correctly Roubillac) (1702/1705〔Dates in Margaret Whinney, ''Sculpture in Britain, 1530 to 1830'', 1981:198.〕 – 11 January 1762) was a French sculptor who worked in England, one of the four most prominent sculptors in London working in the rococo style,〔The others being Michael Rysbrack, Peter Scheemakers and Henry Cheere.〕 He was described by Margaret Whinney as "probably the most accomplished sculptor ever to work in England".〔Whinney 1981:198.〕 ==Life== Roubiliac was born in Lyon. According to J.T. Smith he was trained in the studio of Balthasar Permoser in Dresden, where Permoser, a product of Bernini's workshop, was working for the Protestant Elector of Saxony,〔Smith 1829.〕 and later in Paris, in the studio of his fellow-townsman Nicolas Coustou. Disappointed in receiving second place in the competition for the Prix de Rome, 1730,〔According to Le Roy de Sainte-Croix, ''Vie et ouvrages de L. F. Roubiliac, sculpteur lyonnais'' (1695-1762)'' Paris, 1882. (An extremely rare work, of which a copy is in the National Art Library, Victoria and Albert Museum, it otherwise largely follows Smith 1829) The set subject was a bas-relief of ''Daniel defending Susannah''.〕 he received his medal but not the chance to study in Rome; he moved to London instead.〔Gunnis 1968〕 In 1735 he married Caroline Magdalene Hélot, a member of the French Huguenot community in London, at St Martin's-in-the-Fields. In London, he was employed by "Carter, the statuary" but was introduced by Edward Walpole, son of the Prime Minister, to Henry Cheere, who took him on as an assistant. Sir Edward's intervention resulted in the commission for half the busts in the series for Trinity College, Dublin, and for the Argyll monument commission, if Horace Walpole is correct in his ''Anecdotes of Painting in England''.〔Horace Walpole, ''Anecdotes of Painting in England'', vol. III "Statuaries in the Reign of George II"〕 In 1738 he had a great success with a seated figure of Handel, commissioned by Jonathan Tyers, owner of the Vauxhall Gardens. The statue blends realism and allegory: Handel is shown in modern dress, but plays an Ancient Greek lyre, and has a ''putto'' sitting at his feet. It is now in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum.〔Whinney 1971:77– 8〕 He was recommended for this commission by Cheere.〔Smith 1829 vol. II:94; the often-repeated cost of 300 guineas reported by K.A. Esdaile was a published estimate for the sculpture and an elaborate architectural niche, never executed (Whinney 1981:454 note 9).〕 Its prominent placement in the fashionable pleasure grounds "fixed Roubiliac's fame" as Walpole put it, and he was able to open the studio in St Martin's Lane that he maintained until his death. Roubiliac was a founding member of the St Martin's Lane Academy, a professional association and fraternity of rococo artists that was a forerunner to the Royal Academy. His studio in St Martin's Lane became its meeting room; its members came together again for his funeral.〔Listed in Smith 1829: vol. II:98.〕 He earned his living from commissions for portrait busts and monuments for country churches〔The funeral monument for Bishop Hough, in Worcester Cathedral (1747) was admired in 1753 by Horace Walpole, who found its fully "in the Westminster Abbey style"; "it has a dramatic unity of action unknown in the work of Rysbrack, Scheemakers, or Cheere," Margaret Whinney has observed. (Whinney 1981:203).〕 until 1745, when he received the first of his commissions for a funeral monument in Westminster Abbey, for one commemorating the Duke of Argyll (installed 1749).〔"1745" is the date on the terracotta model, at the Victoria and Albert Museum.〕 George Vertue was one of the work's many admirers; it showed, he thought, "the greatness of his genius in his invention, design and execution, in every part equal, if not superior, to any others" outshining "for nobleness and skill all those before done by the best sculptors this fifty years past"〔Vertue ''Notebooks'', ''Walpole Society'' iv:146 quoted by Gunnis 1968.〕 The mourning figure of ''Eloquence'', the notably unkind John Thomas Smith found to be "such a memorial of his powers, that even his friend Pope could not have equalled it by an epitaph". Even when the patrons were prominent, the churches in which the monuments were installed often lay deep in the English countryside: the monuments to the Duke of Montagu (1752), and of his wife Mary (1753), are in the church at Warkton, Northamptonshire; Horace Walpole, an inveterate country house visitor, noted them: his verdict was "well-performed and magnificent, but wanting in simplicity".〔Walpole, ''Anecdotes''.〕 Neoclassical taste, trained to appreciate svelte line and idealised refinements of nature, did not favour Roubiliac's vigour and immediacy: to J.T. Smith the legs of the figure of Hercules, supporting the bust of Sir Peter Warren in Roubliac's monument in Westminster Abbey (1753) seemed "copied from a chairman's, and the arms from those of a waterman"〔Smith 1829, vol. II;90.〕 About the mid-century Roubiliac was employed for a time as a modeller at the Chelsea porcelain factory, a new outlet for sculptors' talent in Britain; its entrepreneur Nicholas Sprimont stood godfather to the sculptor's daughter Sophie, in 1744.〔; many pieces have been attributed to him; see but only Hogarth's pug "Trump" is securely known to be by Roubiliac (J.V.G. Mallet, "Hogarth's pug in porcelain", ''Victoria & Albert Bulletin'' (1967:45).〕 For a friend like Thomas Hudson he was willing to sculpt figures of ''Painting'' and ''Sculpture'' to ornament a marble chimneypiece in Hudson's house in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields.〔Smith 1829, vol II:93; they were bought at Hudson's sale by Joseph Nollekens〕 For his friend William Hogarth he even carved a portrait of Hogarth's dog "Trump".〔Gunnis 1968: it was lot 239 in James Brindley's sale at Christie's, 1819.〕 His second wife (a considerable heiress) having recently died, he took a brief tour to Italy towards the end of 1752 in the company of several artists.〔Gunnis 1968; Whinney 1981:.〕 Soon after his death an auction sale of the contents of his studio was held, on 12–15 May 1762, from which Dr Matthew Maty purchased a number of his plaster and terracotta models, which he presented to the newly founded British Museum. Prices were derisory, and when his effects were totalled up, Roubiliac's creditors, J.T. Smith said, had to be satisfied with one shilling sixpence in the pound.〔Smith 1829: vol. II:99.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Louis-François Roubiliac」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|