Details of Sculptor

Surname

Durant

Alternative Surname

First Name

Susan

Initial of Surname

D

Year of Birth/Baptism

1827

Flourished

Year of Death

1873

Biographical Details

Susan Durant was a woman of strong character who made her mark as a sculptor at a time when it was rare for women from a privileged background to pursue a career. As her success grew, her circle of friends came to include other professional women who were experts in their own fields as artists, writers, doctors and social reformers. She had a lively intellect, was extremely well-read and keenly supported the enfranchisement and education of women
She was born in Stamford Hill, London, the daughter of George Durant, a silk broker, and his wife Mary. As a young girl she travelled with her parents to Italy, spending at least one winter in Rome, and this was where, according to her obituary in The Queen, she became interested in sculpture. At first she experimented as an amateur, but eventually she decided to work professionally and became the pupil and later the assistant of the French sculptor, Henri Triqueti, working at his studio in the Rue Pigalle in Paris. In later years she divided her time between Paris and London where, after the death of her mother, she took responsibility for the household of her ailing father. She kept a small studio in Radnor Place, Paddington, close to her father’s house, where she was able to work whilst in London.
In 1847 Prince Albert, as President of the Society of Arts, awarded Durant its silver Isis medal for an original bust in plaster (6). She showed two statues at the Great Exhibition of 1851, ‘a study from nature’ (2), and a figure of Belisarius, the legendary Byzantine general (3). In 1857 she lent a statue of Robin Hood to the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition (4). The Athenaeum described this work as showing promise when it was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1856. Another ‘ideal’ work, The negligent watchboy, a subject from Theocritus, was shown at the Academy in 1858 and again at the British Institution in 1860, priced at 250 guineas in marble (52). It was described by the Art Journal as an ‘elaborate and very admirable composition’ (AJ 1858, 171). Whilst working in Paris in 1857, she met the American author, Harriet Beecher Stowe, who agreed to sit for her (15). The Art Journal considered the resulting bust a great success and an excellent likeness (AJ 1857, 176).
Durant was the only woman commissioned by the Corporation of London to execute one of the 17 statues for the Egyptian Hall at the Mansion House in 1861. These were to represent mythical or historical figures from English literature and she chose to depict The faithful shepherdess, the eponymous heroine of John Fletcher’s early-17th century play (5). In 1864, Queen Victoria instructed Triqueti to provide plans for the decoration of a chapel at Windsor Castle, to be known as the Albert chapel, which would commemorate the Prince Consort. This was an ambitious project which included medallion portraits of 12 members of the Royal family. Triqueti gave Durant the contract for these reliefs, nine of which were exhibited at the Royal Academy (30-32, 34, 36, 40, 41, 45, 46) and they took her to Windsor, Osborne, Potsdam and Darmstadt to model the subjects from life. The commission led to close and enduring links with several members of the Royal family. The Queen allowed Durant to give lessons in sculpture to Princess Louise and she formed a lifelong friendship with the Crown Princess of Prussia, who was herself a talented artist. Whilst Durant was working at Osborne in 1865, the Queen’s uncle, Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, King of the Belgians, died. The Queen asked Durant to carve his monument (1), to be placed in a prominent position in St George’s chapel, Windsor, close to the monument to his first wife, Princess Charlotte Augusta. It depicts a recumbent effigy accompanied by two angels and the lion of Belgium. The Queen noted in her journal on 12 July 1867 that she had visited the chapel to see her beloved uncle’s memorial and thought ‘The likeness is remarkably good’. After Durant’s death, it was moved to a side aisle and was then relocated in Christ Church, Esher Green, Surrey, c1879. In 1871 she received her last important commission when Queen Victoria chose Durant to execute a marble bust of herself, ‘of heroic size’, for the newly opened hall of the Inner Temple (26) (Graves II, 1905-6, 391). The hall was badly damaged during the Second World War and the bust has not survived.
Durant gave birth in secret to a son by Triqueti in 1869, whom she named Henry Paul Harvey. He had a distinguished career in the Foreign Office and in his retirement compiled the Oxford Companions to English, French and Classical Literature. On 1 January 1873, at the height of her career, Susan Durant died at 15 Rue Scribe in Paris, after an unsuccessful operation. She was buried at the cemetery of Père Lachaise. Her tombstone has a bronze relief, A concert of angels, by Triqueti. He died the following year.
Arthur Munby, a contemporary diarist, poet and philanthropist, described Susan Durant as ‘a tall and very comely young woman’ with a ‘flashing face and massive rippling chestnut hair’, who was ‘dignified and self-reliant’. Her obituary paid tribute to her intellect, knowledge of literature and a personality that would make her loss ‘well nigh irreparable’ to a large circle of distinguished friends. The ornaments for the Albert chapel and the Queen’s bust in the hall of the Inner Temple ‘opened last year by Princess Louise’, were mentioned in passing, but without critical judgment (The Queen, 17 January 1873).
Sylvia Allen
Literary References: Great Exhib 1851 (1), Fine Arts Section, 846, no 78; Manchester Art Treasures 1857, 134, cat 39; C E Stowe, The Life of HBS, 1889, 228; Gunnis 1968, 135; Derek Hudson, Munby, Man of Two Worlds, 1972, 218; Jeffery 1993, 239, 305-8; Hurtado 1994; Cram and Allen 1998/9, 418-24
Archival References: Census returns, 1861, 1871; Paul Harvey's marriage certificate, naming Henri de Triqueti as his father, Portswood parish church, County of Southampton, no 89, MXA 546125; Durant Papers, Royal A, Windsor Castle, RA VIC/, Add MSS , X/2; X 2/212; Queen Victoria’s Journal, Royal A VIC/QVJ
Will: proved 30 Jan 1873
Auction announcement: 'Excellent furniture, china, glass effects', including marble statuary and medallions, the property of the late Susan Durant, to be sold 5 June, at 3 Bryanston Place, Bryanston Square (The Times, 7 May 1873)
Portraits of the Sculptor: self-portrait, 1853, formerly coll Emma Wallis, Barford, Warks, untraced; author unknown, photograph with her carte de visite, nd, Royal A VIC/Add X 2/1; Margaret Sarah Carpenter, 1860, canvas, exhib RA; author unknown, engraving, published with her obituary, 1873