George III Coadestone Figure
A GEORGE III COADESTONE FIGURE OF A VESTAL
ENGLAND CIRCA 1790
Stamped on the base COADE LAMBETH, also marked with an S incised into a square on the underside of the sculpture.
The present figure is listed as, no.10, ‘A Vestal’ in Coade’s 1784 catalogue.
A coadestone figure of a vestal virgin, after a model by John Bacon the Elder (1740-1799), naturalistically cast and on a circular plinth base. In excellent condition retaining much of its original patina with traces of old dirt.
Height: 42” (107cm), Diameter of base: 13” (33cm).
This fabulous sculpture perfectly demonstrates the skill of the craftsman in the employ of Mrs. Coade’s Artificial Stone Manufactory in Lambeth, South London during the second part of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Eleanor Coade founded her company at Pedlar's Acre in 1769 having moved to London from Lyme Regis, Dorset. Her business quickly gained international recognition and the company produced a vast range of stoneware for an illustrious client base, notably including George III. The versatility and durability of her recipe for 'Artificial Stone' unquestionably aided in establishing its reputation. Indeed, in one of the company's own advertisements they boasted that it has 'a property peculiar to itself of resisting the frost and consequently of retaining that sharpness in which it excels every kind of stone sculpture and even equals marble itself'.
A Vestal goddess of the hearth, modelled by the sculptor John Bacon R.A. (d.1799) who was granted a Royal Appointment to King George III in 1769, is first noted in the 1770s when it was exhibited by Eleanor Coade at the Society of Artists Exhibition and continued to be manufactured at the Lambeth Works until the 1820s. The model was attributed to Bacon in the catalogue of Coade’s Gallery, 1799 (see A. Kelly,Mrs Coade stone. worcs.1990, p.130 fig.4). The Vestal featured in a wall-niche at Beaumont Lodge, Windsor in the early 1790s, and was also supplied to Earl Fitzwilliam at Wentworth House, Yorkshire, in 1814.
