Details of Sculptor

Surname

Abraham

Alternative Surname

First Name

Charles J

Initial of Surname

A

Year of Birth/Baptism

1816

Flourished

Year of Death

1885

Biographical Details

The son of an architect, Robert Abraham, he attended the Royal Academy Schools in 1833, giving his age as 17 and his address as 27 Keppel Street, Russell Square. By his own account he was a pupil of R W Sievier, ‘no mean artist,’ and studied for three years in Paris and Rome (Sydney Morning Herald, 3 March 1845). In 1841 he carved ‘an admirably executed statue’ of the Duke of Wellington for a Mr J N Franklyn, who placed the figure on the lawn of his house near Bristol (2). With its pedestal it was 14 feet high, and could apparently be seen from the road (GM, 1841, 2, 407).
In 1842 he emigrated to Sydney, Australia, where one of his first subjects was the Surveyor-General (10). In 1845 he exhibited a number of busts of notable figures in Sydney, several of them draped all’antica (4-10). The Sydney Morning Herald advertised the exhibition, though the newspaper wrongly described Abraham as a self-taught artist, so occasioning the artist’s publication of his educational credentials. Abraham exhibited at the Paris Exhibition in 1855. He returned to England, where he died in 1885.
Literary References: Moore 1934, 2, 71-2; Gunnis 1968, 13;
Archival References: RA admissions