The Press Saturday, January 18, 1919. Thomas Woolner.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16424, 18 January 1919, Page 8

The Press Saturday, January 18, 1919. Thomas Woolner.

Now that there is so much talk of works of aft as war memorials, our readers will doubtless be doubly interested in a biography of Thomas Woolner, H.A., sculptor and poet, the artist who executed the statue of John Robert Godiey, unquestionably the finest work of its kind in New Zealand. His life, written by his daughter, has just been published, and shows that independent of his eminence in his profession, hoi was in many respects a most remarkable man. He was -born at Had. Leigh in Suffolk in the year 1825. He had veiy little . education in the ordinary sense of the Word, and when" about fourteen years of age was sent to the painter Behnes to study. His father, we are told, was not very sympathetic- about his son's artistic aspirations, and it was his stepmother who helped him to attain his object, and herself paid his expenses. The painter, unfortunately, soon died, but young. Woolner showed such decided talent that the well-known sculptor, William Behnes, brother of the painter, took Tiim aa a pupil. On the day be-

fore his seventeenth birthday he became a student at the Royal Academy Schools, where he worked so well and diligently that lie was able the following year to send a model group of Eleanor sucking tho poison from Princ© Edward's wound, to the Hoyal Academy, where it was exhibited. Woollier not only became a great sculptor—the greatest in England at tho time of his death—but in spite.of his very limited schooling, lie acquired such tasto and skill in literature, that he would have attained eminence as a man of letters if ho had devoted himself to that calling. Ho became tho intimate friend of Tennyson, Carlyle, Browning, Rossetti, and all the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and indeed, of most of tho eminent people of lii.s day, including Mr Gladstone and Darwin. He was on the most affectionate terms with tho Tennyson family, and it was ho who suggested to Tennyson tho subject of "Enoch Arden" and "Avlmcr's Field," which poems in fact aro based on tho stories written out by Woolner for the iioet's use. He it was who discovered tho infolded point of tho human ear, described by Darwin in "The Descent of Man," and christened by him the "Wooinerian tip." It was when modelling his "Puck" that Woolner noticed the little pointed tips that aro seen in so many ears, and ho exaggerated these in the statuetto to a fawn-liko ear, giving an impish look. We must not forget to mention tho great adventure in "VVoolner's life—his voyago to Melbourne at the ago of twonty-seven, with his two friends, Bernhard Smith and Edward Latrobo Bateman, nephew of tho Governor of Victoria, all bent on making their fortunes at tho goldfields. In this they wero not successful, and in less than two years, Woolner, after making somo money at his profession in Sydney and Melbourne, returned to London. Thenceforward his career was one of steady progress, and ho died a comparatively wealthy man in 1892, on October 7th, a day after tho death of his old friend Lord Tennyson, tho Poetijaurcate. Woolner recoived his commission for the statue of John Robert Godley in ] BG3, from his friend Sir John Simeon, who was ono of the closest friends of 1 Godley. Tho residents of Canterbury [ entrusted the carrying out of the work to a committee comprising Lord R. Cavendish, C. Wynne (Godley's brother-in-law), Lord Lyttelton, and Sir John Simeon, but the matter was left by the committeo in the hands of Simeon. In writing to Woolner Sir John Simeon said " I wish' you had Godley well. " You may have met him with me. " He was ono of the truest and noblest "of men, with qualities of head and " heart combined that I havo never "seen equalled. Devotion to duty, " and unbending determination to do " work he had to perform, wero his "principal characteristics. . "Tho statue is meant to he in bronze, " and the sum voted is £1500, not " enough, I heliove, hilt there is not "practically any limit." Writing to Mrs Tennyson on December 10th, 1863, Woolner says: "I am hard at work "on Macaulay and Godley, and some "of the Manchester statues. Macau- " lay having a fat, unrelieved face, I " find it extremely difficult to get the "likeness at all satisfactory: Godley's " is much better for the purpose, being "a thin man." The following May Woolner writes to tho same faithful friend: "Sir John Simeon called to " seo me, and was greatly pleased oyer "my statue of his friend Godley. "Artists and others who have seen it "say I have solved the problem of " modern' costume in sculpture."

It was owing to his success with this statue that Woolner was given the com. mission of executing the London statue of Lord Palmerston for Palace Yard, "Westminster. He did the bust of Mr Gladstone for the Corporation of the City of London in the Guildhall, the marble monument of Sir Edwin Landseer in St. Paul's, and many other notable works, including the statuo of Captain Cook in Sydney. Some of his more imaginative work is extremely beautiful, such as, for example, his "In Memoriam" group—four children in Paradise—and the bas reliefs round the Gladstone bust in the Bodleian—"Achilles shouting from the "Trenches," etc. At the time of his death, he was working on "The Housemaid," a life-sized figure of a servant girl wringing out the cloth with which she washes the doorstep, a sight which may be seon any morning early in London. His daughter says it is a subject which he had long wished to do, having noticed the graceful action. He used to say that servant girls in plain print frocks and caps were the best dressed women in London on week days, and the worst on Sundays. Of his writings, the best known is "My Beautiful "Lady," a poem written in 1863, which went to a third edition in 1866, and in 1887 it was published by Messrs Cassell in their National Library. Christchurch may well feel proud of possessing a specimen of tho work of one who was not only a great artist, but in maiiy respects a great man.