Details of Sculptor

Surname

Goblet

Alternative Surname

First Name

Lewis Alexander

Initial of Surname

G

Year of Birth/Baptism

1764 -

Flourished

Year of Death

Biographical Details

He attended the Royal Academy Schools in 1792, won a medal in 1794 (8), and then became an assistant to Joseph Nollekens. He remained with Nollekens as his principal carver until his master’s death in 1823, and perhaps did not long outlive him. J T Smith states that Goblet carved ‘the whole of the figures’ for the monument to Mrs Coke at Tittleshall, Norfolk (3). This has a full-length effigy in relief, leaning on a column with an elegant twisted pose, while an angel, borne aloft by clouds, gestures heavenwards. A putto seated at Mrs Coke’s feet holds up a flaming heart symbolising her husband’s enduring love. Goblet also executed the figure of Religion from Nollekens’s design for the monument to Mrs Howard at Wetheral, Cumberland (1) and he cut busts from Nollekens’s models. J T Smith later commented that although Nollekens received 120 guineas for each version of his bust of William Pitt the Younger he paid Goblet, Sebastian Gahagan and another assistant as little as £24 for carving them (11). During the last months of Nollekens’s life Goblet slept in his house so that he could be ‘at all times ready, night and day, to render him every assistance in his power’ and he was present at the sculptor’s deathbed (Smith 1920, II, 16). In his will Nollekens left Goblet all the working tools and marbles in his yard, and Goblet’s children Henry and Louisa were bequeathed £100 and £30 respectively. Several of Goblet’s works were auctioned in the sale of Nollekens’s effects which took place on 3 July 1823 (19, 44, 45).
Goblet also carved busts and monuments in his own right and exhibited at the RA between 1799 and 1822, from various London addresses. Gunnis suggests that he may have had a studio of his own at one time, since his address was given as 20, Upper Marylebone Street in a London directory of 1809.
Literary References: Smith 1920, passim; Gunnis 1968, 175; Whinney 1971, 155-157; Penny 1977 (1), 11, 54; Dawson 1999, 50, 55