An egraving of a bust of Ben Jonson

An Engraving of a Bust of Ben Jonson, 1752

A Ticket of the Drury Lane Theatre , 

Tuesday, Mar. 15th, announcing Every man in his humour, for the benefit of Mr. Woodward

March 10th, 1752.

Image from the Bodleian Library

https://digital.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/objects/af9ab876-9030-4115-9fc7-2e89d9316bf3/surfaces/af9ab876-9030-4115-9fc7-2e89d9316bf3/#

I have posted at some length on the busts of Ben Jonson but this is a recent discovery for me

see -

http://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2017/08/bust-of-ben-jonson-anonymous.html

Wedgwood bust of Ben Jonson

Image courtesey Sotheby's New York

Lot 99 23 October 2019.

The catalogue entry states "modelled wearing a doublet and shirt collar, raised on a separate socle base, the reverse of the shoulder with impressed uppercase WEDGWOOD, letters RK, the lower edge with uppercase JOHNSON, the underside of the socle with uppercase WEDGWOOD & BENTLEY mark.

 

Height 17⅝ in.   44.7 cm

 Provenance:

The Milton Milestone Collection of early Wedgwood Pottery, Sotheby Parke Bernet, Inc. New York, April 6, 1976, lot 217

 

Sotheby Parke Bernet, Inc. New York, December 1, 1977, lot 64

 

Catalogue note:

Another example is in the Manchester Museum, illustrated in Robin Reilly, Wedgwood, London, 1989, Vol. I, p. 455, who notes that the plaster cast was supplied by Hoskins & Grant and that the bust is first listed in the Wedgwood and Bentley catalogue of 1774 (see Reilly, 1989, Vol. II, p. 750).

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The Soane Museum Plaster bust of Ben Jonson

Early - mid 19th century?

Perhaps from an original by John Cheere

Not dated and first mentioned in an iventory of 1842

The socle is very unusual and also appears on two other busts (of Camden and Shakespeare) at the Soane Museum

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Ben Jonson

Plaster

Early 19th century

National Trust Sudbury

From a set of four busts by Robert Shout.

Marked on the back Made and sold by R Shout, Holborn

Plaster

Sudbury House, Derbyshire

On loan from Hughenden House, Bucks.

National Trust.

Photograph - National Trust.

 

For more on the Sudbury busts see - https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2017/05/two-mysterious-plaster-busts-probably.html

  see also - https://universitypublishingonline.org/cambridge/benjonson/k/essays/jonsons_images_essay/