The David Garrick bust of Alexander Pope signed by Roubiliac

5.    The David Garrick Marble Bust of Alexander Pope by Roubiliac.

Marble, 16.5 ins. 

Eyes uncarved. 

Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead. Tyne and Wear.

Signed and dated on the back.

on the left  L.F.ROUBILIAC SC. AD VIVUM MDCCXLI 

and on the right A.POPE AETis LIII.

Originally in the collection of David Garrick, sold in his sale of 1823 

bought by W. Seguier 1827, 

thence to Earl of Durham; 

Bought by G.L.Collins at the Lambton Castle Sale in 1932, 

Presented 1937.

 

This bust appears to be the first version of the third Type of Roubiliac bust of Pope, and perhaps predates the terra cotta at the Barber Institute, Birmingham University (see next entry). 

The pronounced curl on top of his head is missing from other marble versions. Wimsatt notes two other versions in plaster, one with bookdealer Kulgin Duval in Falkland Fife Scotland in 1964, the other at Felbrigg Hall Norwich, Norfolk.

First noted in a Garrick inventory in 1777. 

This is the first mention of an identifiable Marble bust of Pope by Roubiliac recorded in the eighteenth Century.

This bust appears to have been recently repolished.

See Wimsatt, 60.1 page 241. and 60.2

Plaster bust of Alexander Pope at Felbrigg Hall, Norwich

Wimsatt states that it is slightly different size to the marble -

this is probably due to mismeasurement as the detail appears to

 replicate exactly that of the Garrick Marble.

Lead version of the Garrick bust - appears to have been taken from the same mould as the plaster at Felbrigg, 

Sold Christie's Dec. 1987, now at Marble Hill House.

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