JOHN FLAXMAN AND JOSIAH WEDGEWOOD

NeoclassicismPrinciples: - a well-schooled artist should be familiar with

the canon and synthetize the traditions to produce something new.

- Artists must respect classic models, they needn’t be original. They are expected to draw their inspiration from classical literature (Illiad, Odyssey)

- Artists should emphasize the intellectual not the emotional.

Neoclassicism developped around 1765 as a reaction against Baroque and Rococo.

It is characterized by: accuracy, restraint, symmetry, order, sharp colours and neat shapes, the use of the chiaroscuro, noble simplicity and calm grandeur. It favours rationality and tradition.

In architecture: the Palladian style illustrated by William Kent in England; the Empire style in France; in the US neoclassicism is represented by the Capitol, Washington DC

Neoclassical painters are influenced by:Nicolas Poussin and Raphaël,The writings of WincklemanThe painting of Pompeii and HerculaneumThe engravings of Greek modelsAmong the best-known neoclassical painters

are: David; Ingres; Flaxman; Canova; Rinehart

Flaxman, biographical elements• John Flaxman (1755-1826) was the son of a plaster cast maker whose London shop

was frequented by many artists.• His childhood environment centred upon sculpture, as a business. • He displayed a precocious talent, first exhibiting at the Royal Academy in 1771 when

he was only 15. • As a young man Flaxman was employed by Josiah Wedgwood: he designed reliefs

for Wedgwoods ceramic wares. • Flaxman wanted to make large-scale, idealistic sculpture. He succeeded in securing

a few commissions for funerary monuments. • In 1787 he traveled to Italy and studied antique statues and the art of the Italian

Renaissance. Flaxman gained extensive experience as a sculptor while in Rome. • Flaxman stayed in Italy 7 seven years and returned home in 1794 a European

celebrity thanks to the success of a series of drawings he had published in 1793 illustrating Homer's 'Iliad'. From the mid-1790s until his death, he dominated the practice of sculpture in Britain.

Homer’s Apotheosis• One of these was the

'Apotheosis of Homer', taken from an engraving of an antique vase in the noted collection of Sir William Hamilton. It can now be seen in the Wedgwood rooms at the Lady Lever. Their grace and purity, hallmarks of the then fashionable 'neo-classical' style, hinted at the character of Flaxman's later sculptures.

Jasperware

Hercules• Wedgwood vase with John Flaxman's 1785

frieze, Hercules in the Garden of the HesperidesEngish, Staffordshire, 18th centuryCeramic: four-color jasperwareh: 20“

• The color scheme of white on blue comes from Roman cameo glass; here he adds ochre and green.

• The storytelling frieze comes from a famous ancient vase in an English collection, already copied by Wedgwood in imitation of the Greek pottery technique. The story is one of the heroic labors of Hercules, his gathering of golden apples from the garden of the Hesperides. Flaxman followed the main pattern of Greek painted vase compositions but based his figures on Roman sculptural types, imitating white marble in clay. The idea for the vase handles, formed of pairs of entwined snakes, goes back to Roman models.

• Vase, late 18th century• In 1775, Josiah Wedgwood perfected

Jasperware, a kind of hard, fine-grained, slightly translucent stoneware that could be decorated by applying another color, customarily white, to the ground. The ground was often stained the well-known shade of "Wedgwood blue," but it could also be lavender, pale green, mustard yellow, cobalt, or other colors. These were often based on the shapes of Greek vases.

• John Flaxman designed this cylindrical vase in the form of a miniature ancient Roman household altar. The sides are divided by pilasters into six panels containing figures of the Muses.

A PILASTER WITH CORINTHIAN CAPITALSGARLANDS OF FLOWERSTHE ATTRIBUTES OF THE GODS (THUNDERBOLT, ARROW, SPEAR)

Mercury supporting Pandora and flying left, 1854

Appolo and MarpesaIn this marble relief Flaxman

depicts Apollo pursuing and attempting to seduce the beautiful mortal Marpessa. Flaxman emphasised the poetic rather than narrative elements of this classical tale. Background details are restrained in the style of Greek vase painting to allow the movements and expressions of the draped figures to become the focus of the composition.

What is the role played by the draperies ?

Cephalus and Aurora• The story of Cephalus and Aurora is told in Ovid's

'Metamorphoses'. Cephalus, an Athenian hero, fell in love with and married Procris. Shortly afterwards while hunting deer he caught the attention of the Goddess of Dawn, Aurora. She was frequently attracted to young mortal men. Descending from her mountain home, Aurora carried Cephalus off with her. However, on finding that he remained faithful to Procris, she allowed him to return home, privately swearing vengeance. She caused a spirit of jealousy to infect their marriage and this eventually resulted in the accidental death of Procris. She suffered a wound inflicted by Cephalus with his hunting spear.

• The two key episodes of Cephalus's story, his abduction by Aurora and his killing of his beloved Procris, became very popular with artists, writers and composers during the eighteenth century, especially in Europe. Flaxman was thus joining a distinguished tradition. Flaxman may have been struck by Agostino Carracci's well-known fresco in the Farnese Palace. The subject may also have suited the exercise of making a small work, classical in style, combining two figures in graceful movement.

'Cephalus and Aurora, 1789-90', by John Flaxman

• Flaxman travelled to Rome in 1787. It was here that he created 'Cephalus and Aurora'. From a letter of January 1790, it is suggested that he had worked on the plaster model of 'Cephalus and Aurora' over the previous winter, intending to cast it in bronze.

• The scale of the figures, smaller than life-size, indicates that Flaxman was not trying to make a grand public statement. He modelled the figure of Cephalus on the famous 'Apollo Belvedere'. His vision of Aurora has close parallels with classical statues of Winged Victory, which he drew at the time in his sketchbooks.

• In January 1790 Flaxman would have thought that his stay in Rome was coming to an end. He may have considered 'Cephalus and Aurora' as its culmination. Two months later, however, the Earl of Bristol commissioned a colossal marble statue, 'The Fury of Athamas'.

• It is sometimes wrongly said that 'Cephalus and Aurora' was commissioned from Flaxman by the young Thomas Hope. Hope did indeed commission several other works from Flaxman early in 1792. He may have already purchased 'Cephalus and Aurora' by then or may have persuaded Flaxman to carve the subject in marble from the existing plaster.

• In 1799, Hope began developing a large town house in London for the display of his sculptures and other antiquities. He created a Flaxman room with 'Cephalus and Aurora' as its centrepiece. He surrounded the work with mirrors so that visitors could see it from different angles from one spot.

St Michael Overcoming Satan

Exhibited 1822PlasterUniversity College,

LondonModel of a work

intended for Lord Egremont's house at Petworth

The Fury of Athamas

How is the composition used in order to suggest pain ?

Which elements are borrowed from ancient Greek sculpture ?

How is the balance between passions and rational order achieved ?