The Victoria and Albert Museum Bust of Laocoon by Joseph Wilton (1722 - 1802).
Height 61 Cms.
Inscribed J Wilton Ft: 1758.
It has the oval plan /section socle most frequently and uniquely used by Wilton.
It was included as lot100 in the sale by Christie's on 5July 1823(third day) of Nollekens' collection.
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O127050/laocoon-bust-wilton-joseph-ra/
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The Ashmolean Plaster Cast of the Bust of Laocoon.
The piece mould marks are plainly visible in the second photograph
The eared socle is unusual - suggesting to me that it is not an English cast.
63 x 39 x 32 cm.
Jean-André Getti, French (active early 19th century).
Manufactured by Musée du Louvre Atelier de Moulage.
The RA previously possessed another cast, shown in Henry
Singleton’s 1795 painting The Royal Academicians in General Assembly, but that
was undoubtedly superseded by the cast from the Prince Regent, which was of an
unusually high quality.
The original statue has a complicated history of
restorations. When the work was discovered, Laocoön's right arm and the right
hands of both sons were missing. There are various deliberations about whether
Laocoon's arm should be bent or (as it is now) straight. When the statue was
removed to France the restorations were removed and replaced by casts from a
late 17th century cast of a model whose arms were supposed to be by Giradon.
On 10 August 1793, the Muséum Central des Arts de la République was inaugurated at the Louvre.
On 14 December 1794, a year after the opening of this temple to art, the arts commission ordered plaster copies of forty of the most beautiful ancient sculptures then held at the museum. The task was accepted by two Tuscan formatori: Jean-André Getti and Ètienne Micheli.
The event was associated with the establishment of a famous plaster casting studio and the beginnings of the first public collection of plaster copies in Paris.
In 1816, after the end of the
revolution, Louis XVIII transformed the Muséum Central des Arts de la
République into Le Musée Royal du Louvre. Two years later, the position of the
royal formatore was bestowed on François-Henry Jacquet, one of the most famous
and respected French plaster makers. Jacquet rapidly monopolised the market and
gained exclusive rights to create forms for casting marbles contained at the
Louvre. His list of plasters, published in 1845 and offered for sale, and at the
same time the firstrst printed sales catalogue of Louvre’s
works, confirms the commercialisation of the royal
workshop.
