Full-Scale Gesso Model for the Commemorative Sculpture of Alfred Lord Tennyson

Sculpture Height (Total): 399 cm
Sculpture height: 379 cm
Sculpture width: 176.5 cm
Sculpture depth: 160 cm

Full Scale Gesso Model for the Commemorative Sculpture of Alfred Lord Tennyson: model for the sculpture from which the bronze cast was taken; full- length standing figure of the poet in a long cloak looking at proper left hand raised to his chest contemplating a small bunch of violets (not visible but interpreted as Watts's reference to Tennyson's poem) depicted with his dog seated at his feet on the right.

G.F.Watts

Monument to Lord Tennyson

1898-1903

Full-scale gesso grosso model

watts was a great friend of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-92), so when the Poet Laureate died, Watts offered to make a memorial sculpture of him for expenses only. Watts wanted to demonstrate his friend's love of nature and drew inspiration from Tennyson's poem 'Flower in the crannied wall'. The figure ponders his hand, while his of Karenina peers up and waits patiently for her master. 

Watts worked on this gesso grosso (mixture of plaster, hemp and glue) model right up until the day before it left his Compton studio to be case in 1903. Sadly, he died before it was placed at Lincoln Cathedral in 1905.