Background
He was born on 15 July 1775 in London. His father's name was also Richard Westmacott.
(Excerpt from Handbook of Sculpture: Ancient and Modern T...)
Excerpt from Handbook of Sculpture: Ancient and Modern The chief object in reprinting the following pages is to supply a want that has been felt by students in sculpture who have desired to know something more of their art than the merely technical processes to be learnt in academies, schools, or the workshops of sculptors. The writer remembers when he would have been glad to know where to find some elementary work that would afford information upon the history of the art, and give a greater interest to its practice, by shewing its rise and condition in ancient times, and especially pointing out the steps by which it reached the eminence it attained among the Greeks. No such work in English was in existence. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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He was born on 15 July 1775 in London. His father's name was also Richard Westmacott.
While yet a boy learned the rudiments of the plastic art in the studio of his father, who was then a sculptor of some reputation. In 1793, at the age of eighteen, he went to Rome and became a pupil of Cahova, then at the height of his fame. Under the prevailing influences of Italy at that time, Westmacott devoted all his energies to the study of classical sculpture, and throughout his life his real sympathies were with pagan rather than with Christian art.
In 1798, on the 20th of February, he married Dorothy Margaret, daughter of Dr Wilkinson of Jamaica. On his return to London Westmacott began to exhibit his works yearly at the Royal Academy, the first work so exhibited beinghis bust of Sir William Chambers.
In 1805 he was elected an associate, and in 1811 a full member of the Royal Academy, his diploma work being a " Ganymede " in high relief; in 1827 he was appointed to succeed Flaxman as Royal Academy professor of sculpture, and in 1837 he was knighted.
A very large number of important public monuments were executed by him, including many portrait statues; but little can be said in praise of such works as the statue on the duke of York's column (1833), the portrait of Fox in Bloomsbury Square, or that of the duke of Bedford in Russell Square.
Much admiration was expressed at the time for Westmacott's monuments to Collingwood and Sir Ralph Abercromby in St Paul's Cathedral, and that of Mrs Warren in Westminster Abbey; but subjects like these were far less congenial to him than sculpture of a more classical type, such as the pedimental figures representing the progress of civilization over the portico of the British Museum, completed in 1847, and his colossal nude statue of Achilles in bronze, copied from the original on Monte Cavallo in Rome, and reared in 1822 by the ladies of England in Hyde Park as a compliment to the duke of Wellington.
He died on the 16t of September 1856.
(Excerpt from Handbook of Sculpture: Ancient and Modern T...)
Under the prevailing influences of Italy at that time, Westmacott devoted all his energies to the study of classical sculpture, and throughout his life his real sympathies were with pagan rather than with Christian art.
In 1798, on the 20th of February, he married Dorothy Margaret, daughter of Dr Wilkinson of Jamaica.
