AMELIA ROBERTSON PATON (SCOTTISH, 1821-1904) A MARBLE BUST OF A YOUNG WOMAN DATED 1860 Portrayed wearing classical style low cut wrap, head tilted wistfully up to her right, signed a to reverse AMELIA R. PATON SC EDINr 1860 approximately 58.5cm high, 46.5cm wide acrossProvenance: Formerly from the collection of Baroness Nancy Oakes von Hoyningen-Huene, daughter of Sir Harry Oakes, 1st Baronet, British gold mine owner, entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist.'Amelia Paton (1821-1904) was a largely self-taught sculptor of considerable ability. She could, probably should, have become our first woman member but sadly that was not to be. Robin Rodger; 'The Patons of Dunfermline'- Royal Scottish Academy, December 10, 2021.Amelia Paton was born at Dunfermline Park, Fife into an artistic family. Her brothers, Joseph Noel Paton, and Walter Hugh Paton, became famous painters and illustrators, respected by contemporary collectors, elevated by royalty and with a legacy of work that's embraced and celebrated by collectors. Amelia, denied official recognition within her lifetime, has yet to be celebrated in quite the same way.Her childhood was spent at the family home of Wooer's Alley, Dunfermline. She seems to have been largely self-taught, creating small miniature portraits and starting to learn the rudiments of sculpting through modelling in clay. It seems that her first tools were an ivory crochet-needle and a knife but eventually she was able to borrow better tools - from a plasterer.This foray into work as a sculptor was short-lived as first she fell ill, then her brothers left home, and her mother fell ill. She remained at home nursing her mother through her final illness until her passing and her father's remarriage. At the age of 39, she moved from her childhood home to live with her two brothers in at 33 George Square, Edinburgh, At this time it seems she started working from her own studio and trained as a sculptor under William Brodie. The crossover of taste from her brothers' works would have been almost osmotic. In 1860 she exhibited publicly for the first time when two of her busts appeared at the Royal Scottish Academy. It may be that this lot is one of these two busts titled simply as 'A Young Woman' and recorded by 'Bedouin' as worthy of note in his review of the 1860 exhibition 'the works(of sculpture) are few but of high merit' (MacPhail's Edinburgh ecclesiastical journal and literary review, Volumes 29-30 1861, pp. 188-189). It's almost certainly the earliest work in marble she may have exhibited.It has been suggested that a better possible title for this work might be 'The Lover'- as inspired by her brother Joseph Noel Paton's illustration of 1857 'Hesperus the Evening Star, Sacred to Lovers' (now held in The Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Accession number 1033). This work does seem to strongly accord with their portrayals of women of legend and myth influenced by Pre-Raphaelitism.In 1862, Amelia became the second wife of the celebrated artist and early photographer David Octavius Hill and went onto to exhibit over 60 sculptures at the Royal Scottish Academy, the Royal Academy, Glasgow Institute, the Royal Hibernian Academy and at the International Exhibition in Dublin in 1865. Her work tended to be studies of Arthurian and Shakesperean heroes, family friends, and notable figures such as the historian Thomas Carlyle, artist Sir George Harvey and physicist Sir David Brewster. Her skill and talent shone through, and she was commissioned to carry out several public statues, rare for a female artist of this period. Buoyed by the confidence shown in her by her husband and her brother Joseph Noel in 1868/1869 she sculpted a full length statue of the explorer David Livingstone, who sat for Amelia during the modelling, just prior to leaving the country for his final journey to Africa. Exhibited to great acclaim in London in the New Rooms of the Royal Academy in 1869 the figure now stands in Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh and was described by William Sharp in 1902 as the 'the first work of sculpture done by a woman which has been erected in any public place in Britain'. Subsequent public commissions included the statue of Robert Burns commissioned by Dumfries town council in 1877, and three of the statues which adorn the Scott Monument in Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh.Despite the patronage of two eminent brothers and her husband, Amelia still faced the constraints of Victorian attitudes at the time towards gender equality and was excluded from membership of the Royal Scottish Academy. In response she took matters into her own hands and in 1877 helped establish the Albert Institute of Fine Arts at Edinburgh's Shandwick Place, an artistic institution that did not discriminate on grounds of gender. Above the ornate doorway to the building, Amelia's relief portrait bust of Prince Albert and the figures of 'Sculpture and Painting' can still be seen.The 1891 census described Hill as 'sculptor, retired' but she continued to exhibit at the Royal Scottish Academy until 1902, aged 82. She died at her house, Newington Lodge, 38 Mayfield Terrace on 5 July 1904 aged 83.At the time of cataloguing there is no catalogue raisonné of her work. Only a handful of work by her has appeared at public auction- with half of them miniature portraits, another of her passions. Her work is little known to the wider general public but in the last twenty years her work has started to be reappraised, lauded and celebrated with several books featuring her life and work. In 2021, the bicentenary of her birth, a walking tour of her Edinburgh works was instigated as 'The Amelia Tour' by a descendant Cat Berry. Hopefully the appearance at auction of this very early, elegant and sensual bust by this neglected Victorian female artist, with its leanings to the Pre-Raphaelite movement, may help redress some of the lack of awareness of her life and work.Please follow this link for the full catalogue footnote. Condition Report: Mild wear, marks, knocks and scratches as per age, handling, use, and cleaning. Some loss to lowest edge, small scuffs and some later colour marks to hair and neck. Under UV there are signs of remedial infill- whether this is from construction or later we cannot tell. These are scattered across mainly the flesh areas- also to the left hand ear that looks to have been pierced for earring and filled. Some natural flaws to stone notably to her right shoulder. Overall with some surface dirt Please see additional images for visual references to condition which form part of this condition report. Condition Report Disclaimer
