Details of Sculptor

Surname

Marchant

Alternative Surname

First Name

Nathaniel, RA

Initial of Surname

M

Year of Birth/Baptism

1739

Flourished

Year of Death

1816

Biographical Details

Marchant was primarily a gem-engraver but also produced a number of medals and works in wax. He was born in Mayfield, Sussex, possibly the son of a watchmaker. He appears to have had family connections with Pennsylvania and possibly lived there a short while himself as a child. He was apprenticed to the celebrated intaglio-maker Edward Burch RA, c1754-1765, and attended drawing classes for a short while at St Martin’s Lane Academy, London. He won several prizes for gem-carving from the Society of Artists, including an interpretation of the Apollo from the Villa Medici and a head of Homer in 1762 and a Dancing faun and head of the Apollo Belvedere in 1764, all taken from originals and casts in the collection of the 3rd Duke of Richmond. Although it was disputed even at the time whether gem-carving constituted sculpture, in a letter written to the Society in 1768 Marchant requested that both he and Burch be described as sculptors. ‘The word Sculptor’, he wrote, ‘is more applicable to our profession than Engraver’ (RA, SA/34/14).
Although it was common for 18th-century intaglio and cameo carvers to work from antique examples of gemstone carving, Marchant made a name for himself by using antique sculpture as his predominant source material. This interest in classical sculpture led him to travel to Rome late in 1772, with the help of his first significant patron, the 4th Duke of Marlborough. He remained there until 1788, living first in Strada Paolina. In 1774 he moved to the artists’ quarter of via Babuino, apparently sharing his studio with the painters Solomon Delane and Henry Tresham. In 1786 he took a house and studio in the more prosperous area of strada Felice (now via Sistina), not far from the Spanish Steps, which can be taken as a sign of his increasing success. Although Marchant made brief trips to Florence, Naples, Tivoli and Venice, most of his time was spent in Rome, where he specialised increasingly in intaglio sealstones with designs taken from the ancient sculpture he saw in the city, particularly in the newly-created Museo Pio Clementino. Marchant offered many of these intaglios to Marlborough who was a keen collector of his work, but he was in growing demand from the many aristocratic visitors who went to Italy from Britain and other parts of Europe on the Grand Tour. In Marchant’s carved gem-stones they found beautifully-made mementoes of the antiquities seen on their travels with the added advantage of portability. Although a minor part of his output, Marchant also produced a small number of portrait intaglios whilst in Italy, notably of Pope Pius VI in 1781, Emma Hamilton in 1786, and Catherine the Great of Russia in 1788.
Marchant exhibited regularly with the Society of Artists in London from 1765 to 1774, sending his work over from Italy in 1773 and 1774. In consequence he experienced at first hand the excessive import duty charged to overseas British artists when they sent their work home for exhibition, and he was asked to represent the British artists in Italy in a petition to the British government to reduce tariffs on the import of artworks. This was successful. After a gap of several years, when he worked mainly on commissions, Marchant began to exhibit in Britain again in 1781, this time sending work to the Royal Academy.
When he returned to Britain in 1788, Marchant settled in New Bond Street, London. Despite his feeling that his abilities as an artist and services to art deserved some recognition, official honours and public appointments were ‘disappointingly slow to follow’ (Seidmann, 1985, 152). An attempt to become keeper of the King’s Pictures shortly after his return met with failure, and although he became an ARA in 1791, Marchant had to wait a further 18 years, until 1809, to be elected a full Academician. He was considered by some in the RA to be over-keen to claim a ‘right’ to be elected, particularly by the way he played on his success in reducing import tax on artworks. There remained a doubt also over whether gem-carving was a form of sculpture, particularly with the increasing emergence of mass-produced copies of inferior quality. In addition, Marchant’s case was probably not helped by the jealousy of his former master, Burch, who had become an RA in 1772. Official recognition came, however, from overseas academies of art, for Marchant was elected a member of the Academies of Vienna in 1792, Stockholm in 1795 and Copenhagen in 1798.
In 1797 he began to work for the Royal Mint as an assistant engraver to Lewis Pingo, a post which brought a certain prestige, though it prompted Thomas Frankland to write that employing Marchant in this way ‘made a mockery of his superior talents’ (Seidmann 1987, 22). Certainly Marchant’s designs for coins, medals and seals do not appear to have found particular favour with the royal household although he was diligent in producing them, often to the detriment of his professional career as an artist. In 1799 he was made the senior engraver at the Stamp Office, a post which allowed him to move into Somerset House on Strand.
Marchant was generally well-liked and admired both as a person and an artist, although Charles Long, 1st Baron Farnborough, dismissed him as ‘a driveller’ (Ingamells 1997, 641). Against Long’s disdain must be set the overwhelming number of positive comments by Marchant’s contemporaries, who praised him for his moral integrity as well as his artistic talent. Marchant counted the artists Joseph Farington, Henry Fuseli and John Flaxman RA, and the art-collector Charles Townley, among the many friends who regularly dined with him in his apartment in Somerset House. He died on 24 March 1816 after a long illness, and is buried at Stoke Poges, Bucks, where there is an inscribed memorial stone to him by Flaxman. Marchant never married and left a fortune of £24,000. The executors of his will were Flaxman and William Penn of Pennsylvania. The latter also oversaw his funeral.
Michael Paraskos
Literary References: Lipscomb 1847, 565; Graves 1905-6, V, 180-82; Gunnis 1968, 253; RSA Journal, vol 133, 1985, 150-53; Seidmann 1985, 152; Seidmann 1987, 5-27 (with comprehensive list of the engraved gems); Grove (Seidmann); Ingamells 1997, 641; ODNB (Seidmann)
Archive References: RA, SA/34/14; RG/JP, 5, 880-2; Soane Note Books, no.110, 39, Soane Museum
Portraits of the Sculptor: George Dance, 1794, pencil and chalk on paper, RA 03/3261; William Daniell, after George Dance, etching, NPG D12085; John Flaxman, pen and ink, MFAB 53.2618; Hugh Douglas Hamilton, c1779, oil on canvas, Soane Museum