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Patrick MacDowell

{{Short description|Irish-born British sculptor (1799–1870)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2019}}

File:Patrick_Macdowell.jpg

Patrick MacDowell {{Post-nominals|country=GBR|RA}} (12 August 1799 – 9 December 1870) was an Irish-born British sculptor operating through the 19th century.W G Strickland, Dictionary of Irish Artists, (1913); Rupert Gunnis, Dictionary of British Sculptors 1660–1851 (1953); Homan Potterton, Irish Church Monuments, 1570-1880 (Belfast 1975).

Biography

MacDowell was born in Belfast, on 12 August 1799. His father died whilst he was young and the family lived in relative poverty.

Image:Daydream-Patrick-MacDowell.jpg, Copenhagen]]

File:Sir Edward Pellew by Patrick MacDowell, 1846, Greenwich Maritime Museum, London.jpg, London (close-up)]]

File:Patrick MacDowell RA Wood Lane.jpg]]

From 1807 to 1811, he boarded at a school in Belfast, run by an engraver named Gordon, who encouraged his attempts at drawing, and from 1811 to 1813 he was under the tuition of a clergyman in Hampshire. {{sfn|Graves|1893}}

Around 1811, he moved with his mother to Hampshire in England, where they had relatives. In 1813, at age 14 (the then standard age to begin apprenticeships), he was apprenticed to a coach-builder in London. However, his master went bankrupt and his training as a coach-builder ended abruptly.Dictionary of British Sculptors, 1660-1851, Rupert Gunnis During this time he was lodging in the house of Pierre Francois Chenu, the sculptor. It is presumed that this engendered an interest in sculpture within the young MacDowell.

On the recommendation of John Constable the painter, he went to the Royal Academy Schools and he exhibited at the Academy from 1822 until his death.

He was elected a Member on 10 February 1846 and presented as his diploma work a "Nymph.".[http://www.racollection.org.uk/ixbin/indexplus?_IXACTION_=file&_IXFILE_=templates/full/person.html&_IXTRAIL_=Academicians&person=5782 Royal Academy of Arts website]

Death

MacDowell died at his home in Wood Lane, Highgate, London on 9 December 1870, aged 71, and was buried on the eastern side of Highgate Cemetery. His gravestone incorrectly records the year of his death as 1871.{{sfn|Graves|1893}}

Other works

MacDowell's works include a statue of Sir William Brown in the Great Hall of St George's Hall, Liverpool.Sharples, Joseph; Pollard, Richard. Liverpool. In {{cite book | last =Pollard| first =Richard |author2=Nikolaus Pevsner |author2-link=Nikolaus Pevsner | title =The Buildings of England: Lancashire: Liverpool and the South-West | publisher =Yale University Press | year =2006 | location =New Haven & London | isbn =0-300-10910-5 | page =296 }} His life-size memorial, in marble, to the young Earl of Belfast (died 1853) showing the deceased on his deathbed attended by his mother, was in Belfast Castle Chapel. It was moved to Belfast City Hall.

A statue of Sir Edward Pellew, 1st Viscount Exmouth by MacDowell stands in the centre of the Greenwich Maritime Museum.

His last major work was the Europe allegorical group at the Albert Memorial in London.

See also

Notes

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;Attribution

{{DNB|wstitle=MacDowell, Patrick |first=Robert Edmund|last=Graves|volume=35}}

External links

{{Commons category|Patrick MacDowell}}

  • [http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/speel/sculpt/mcdowell.htm Patrick MacDowell Info & Sculpture]
  • [https://archive.org/stream/DictionaryOfNationalBiographyVolume35#page/n77/mode/2up MACDOWELL, PATRICK] In: Dictionary of National Biography, 1893, volume= 35 - pages=pages 66–67

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Category:1799 births

Category:1870 deaths

Category:Burials at Highgate Cemetery

Category:Royal Academicians

Category:British sculptors

Category:Artists from Belfast

Category:British male sculptors