Art Collections Online
Nymph and Cupid
GIBSON, John (1791 - 1866)
Media: marble
Size: 152.2 cm
Acquired: 1997; Purchase; with assistance of National Art Collections Fund / National Heritage Lottery Fund
Accession Number: NMW A 5979
Gibson records that he 'spent most of the winter of 1859 modeling a group representing what I saw in the street a few years ago, when I made a sketch of the action - a girl of about fourteen throwing up a child and kissing it. This clay model occupied me for three months. The spontaneous expression of affection witnessed by Gibson has been transformed into a group with an elegant restraint appropriate to a Nymph and Cupid of the classical world. This piece was carved for William Robertson Sandbach of Hafodunnos Hall near Abergele. Another version was bought by the Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, who visited Gibson's Roman studio in 1859 and 1862.