A Mid-19thC Gilded & Painted Plaster Bust of a Young Queen Victoria
SOLD
Origin: English
Period: Mid-Victorian
Provenance: Unknown
Date: c.1840-60
Width: 13.5”
Height: 21.75”
Base Diameter: 7” (all at extremities)
The well sized three-quarter plaster bust of Queen Victoria, with wear and weathering commensurate with age, shown in her younger years and in ceremonial garb, to a circular socle plinth, the crown painted in gilt and with remnants of original paint elsewhere and surviving from the mid-Victorian period.
There are small chips and general wear to the top surface of the bust but she remains in decent honest condition with losses to the socle as photographed.
Queen Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. Her reign of 63 years and 7 months, which is longer than that of any other British monarch and the longest of any female monarch in history, is known as the Victorian era. It was a period of industrial, cultural, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom, and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire.
The bust's execution points to local production and its design appears to be a composite of existing images of Queen Victoria in different media from the 1840s -1860s. The coronet and the style of hair and dress resemble those in profile portraits featured on medals designed by the English medallist William Wyon, particularly those issued for the opening of the new Royal Exchange in London in 1844. Well known marble busts such as that by the Scottish sculptor Alexander Brodie completed in 1867 show similar facial features.
A highly decorative bust of one of the most important monarchs of all time.
