Background
Harry Bates was born at Stevenage, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, on the 26th of April 1850; the son of Joseph and Anne Bates.
Harry Bates was born at Stevenage, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, on the 26th of April 1850; the son of Joseph and Anne Bates.
In 1879 he came to London and entered the Lambeth School of Art, studying under Jules Dalou and Rodin. In 1881 he was admitted to the Royal Academy schools. He then went to Paris and studied under Rodin.
Bates began his career as a carver's assistant, and before beginning the regular study of plastic art he passed through a long apprenticeship in architectural decoration. A head and three small bronze panels (the "Odyssey, ") executed by Bates in Paris, were exhibited at the Royal Academy, and selected for purchase by the Chantrey trustees; but the selection had to be cancelled because they had not been modelled in England. His "Aeneas" (1885), "Homer" (1886), three "Psyche" panels and "Rhodope" (1887) all showed marked advance in form and dignity. His "Pandora, " in marble and ivory, which was bought in the same year for the Chantrey Bequest, are now in the Tate Gallery. The portrait-busts of Harry Bates are good pieces of realism-strong, yet delicate in technique, and excellent in character. His statues have a picturesqueness in which the refinement of the sculptor is always felt. Among the chief of these are the fanciful "Maharaja of Mysore, " somewhat overladen with ornament, and the colossal equestrian statue of Lord Roberts (1896) upon its important pedestal, girdled with a frieze of figures, now set up in Calcutta, and a statue of Queen Victoria for Dundee. But perhaps his masterpiece, showing the sculptor's delicate fancy and skill in composition, was an allegorical presentment of "Love and Life" a winged male figure in bronze, with a female figure in ivory being crowned by the male. Bates died in London on the 30th of January 1899, his premature death robbing English plastic art of its most promising representative at the time.
Bates is known as one of the most important sculptors working with the traditions of the decorative arts within the New Sculpture movement and is often understood to be one of primary representatives of international Symbolism within British sculpture. In 1892, after the exhibition of his vigorously designed "Hounds in Leash, " Bates was elected into the Royal Academy of Arts. Bates won a silver medal in the national competition at South Kensington, while studying at the Lambeth School of Art. In 1883 he won the gold medal and the travelling scholarship of £200 with his relief of "Socrates teaching the People in the Agora, " which showed grace of line and harmony of composition.
He was a member of the Royal Academy of Arts and a member of the Art Workers Guild.
