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{{Tradotto da|en|Thomas Woolner|23 aprile 2009|285559509
Thomas Woolner (Hadleigh, 17 dicembre 1825 – 7 ottobre 1892) è stato uno scultore e poeta inglese. [[Image:Stamford Raffles statue.jpg|thumb|right|225px|Replica of a statue of Sir Stamford Raffles by Woolner, erected at the spot where he first landed at Singapore. The original statue stands at the Victoria Memorial Hall.
Biografia
Nato nel Suffolk il suo insegnante fu lo scultore William Behnes. Fu uno dei membri fondatori della confraternita dei preraffaelliti, espose i suoi lavori alla Royal Academy dal 1843.
Le sue inclinazioni classicheggianti si trovarono in contrasto con il medievalismo dei preraffaelliti, ma la pratica dell'osservazione precisa della natura si trovò d'accordo con le sue idee.
Woolner's classical inclinations were rather difficult to reconcile with Pre-Raphaelite Medievalism, but his belief in close observation of nature was consistent with their aims.
Woolner's sculptures immediately after the foundation of the Brotherhood in 1848 display close attention to detail. He made his name with forceful portrait busts and medallions, but was at first unable to make a living.
He was forced to emigrate to Australia for a period, but eventually returned to Britain, soon establishing himself as both a sculptor and art-dealer. His visit to Australia nevertheless helped him to obtain commissions there and elsewhere for statues of British imperial heroes, such as Captain Cook and Sir Stamford Raffles.
However, his most personal and complex works in sculpture are probably Civilisation and Virgilia. These demonstrate his attempt to express the tension between the static stone and the dynamic desires of the figures represented emerging into solidity from it.
He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1875 and served as professor of sculpture from 1877 to 1879.
Woolner was also a poet of some reputation in his day. His early poem My Beautiful Lady is a Pre-Raphaelite work, emphasising intense unresolved moments of feeling. His later narrative works, Pygmalion, Silenus and Tiresius renounce Pre-Raphaelitism in favour of an often eroticised classicism.
Woolner was a close friend of Alfred Tennyson, providing him with the scenario for his poem Enoch Arden. His speculations about human anatomy also impressed Charles Darwin, who named part of the human ear the 'Woolnerian Tip' after a feature in Woolner's sculpture Puck.
Thomas Woolner morì istantaneamente per colpa di un ictus all'età di 67 anni. Sua moglie Alice morì nel 1912. Il loro figlio Hugh, tornando indietro dal funerale di lei verso New York si imbarcò sul Titanic. Tuttavia sopravvisse all'affondamento. [1]
Gallery
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- "Virgilia bewailing the absence of Coriolanus" in Strawberry Hill, London
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- Illustration by Holman Hunt to Woolner's "My Beautiful Lady", published in "The Germ", 1850
Note
- ^ [Hugh Woolner http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/fleecing_of_woolner.html]