Details of Sculptor

Surname

Bacon

Alternative Surname

First Name

Charles

Initial of Surname

B

Year of Birth/Baptism

1821

Flourished

Year of Death

c1885

Biographical Details

A gem-engraver and sculptor in bronze and marble, his life remains obscure though he was responsible for some major civic sculpture. He exhibited for the first time at the Royal Academy in 1842 as an intaglio engraver of gemstones, giving his address as 15, White Conduit Grove, Pentonville. Works in this material were shown until 1849, including two after subjects by E H Baily (26, 30), and one after John Flaxman (29). In 1844 his address was 2, Strand and in 1845 he lived at 18 Greek Street. In 1846 he enrolled at the Academy Schools on the recommendation of the poet Alaric Watts (1797-1864), and in 1847, perhaps as a show of gratitude, he exhibited a bust of Watts, his first-known three-dimensional work of sculpture (9).
Bacon tried his hand at ideal subjects including a marble statue of Helen veiled before Paris, for which he asked a sum of 500 guineas (2). He also carved a number of busts, and his head of John Hullah won him a notice in the Illustrated London News (12). By 1849 Bacon had begun to work in bronze and in 1855, when he showed at the British Institution, he gave his address as ‘The Statue Foundry, Lower Belgrave Place, Pimlico’ (Graves 1875, 19). In 1857 he was living at 7, Loughborough Place, Brixton, from where he submitted for exhibition his bronze statue of Felix Mendelssohn (4). The statue, which shows the cmposer thoughtfully touching his chin, was the centrepiece of the Mendelssohn Festival at the Crystal Palace, Sydenham in May 1860.
In 1861 Bacon was commissioned to provide a bronze statue to be erected at Spilsby in memory of a famous Arctic explorer born in Spilsby, Sir John Franklin (5). Despite his earlier successes Bacon was still apparently little known, for on hearing of his selection as executant, a correspondent in the Art Journal, asked: ‘Who is Mr. Bacon? We do not know of any living sculptor of that name’ (AJ 1861, 29). Bacon produced an imposing full-length statue of the explorer with a telescope and other nautical attributes. A series of commissions followed, including a conventional bust of Warren Stormes Hale, the Lord Mayor of London (15), a frontal bust of G F W Mortimer which combined modern dress with draperies all’antica (16) and a colossal head of Shakespeare for the Agricultural Hall, Islington (14).
The apogee of Bacon’s career came with the commission from Charles Oppenheim for a bronze equestrian statue of the Prince Consort, erected at Holborn Circus in 1874 (7). Bacon chose a pose that he had earlier used for his statue of the politician, John Erle-Drax, who was presented on a prancing horse, waving an enormous top hat at an imaginary crowd (3). Prince Albert also waves a cocked hat. The pedestal, financed by the City Corporation, is decorated with formal, static reliefs celebrating the Prince’s achievements. The statue, which cost £2000 and was unveiled on 17 January 1874, was ill-received. The Art Journal remarked only that ‘on the principle that one must not too narrowly examine a gift horse, we abjure criticism’ (AJ 1874, 61). Lord Edward Gleichen, who did not abjure, considered it ‘a poor thing’ (Gleichen 1928, 134). Bacon’s last major work was the figure of John Candlish, MP for Sunderland, which was erected by public subscription at a cost £1000, and was cast at the foundry of H. Young & Co in Pimlico (8). The sculptor continued to exhibit at the Royal Academy until 1884, and his name appeared in the directory of artists published in The Year’s Art in 1885. Nothing is known of him after that date, which may have been the year of his death. He was then living at Bolton Studios in South Kensington, where he had been since 1873.
According to Graves, a ‘G Bacon’ (of whom there is no other trace) showed heads of Minerva, Antinous and Ariadne at the Royal Academy between 1846 and 1848 (Graves, I, 1905-6, 87). Since this address is the same as that given for Charles Bacon, he may be a brother or some other relation (unless, of course, the ‘G’ in the catalogue is a misprint for ‘C’).
MGS
Literary References: Graves 1875, 19; Graves I, 1905-6, 87; Gunnis 1968, 24; Usherwood 2000, 181-2
Archival References: RA admissions
Miscellaneous Drawings: Design for a monument to Princess Charlotte Augusta, Royal Coll RL 23461