Throughout the Royal Botanic Gardens there are many wonderful statues that adorn the steps and
paths.
As it is Spring in Sydney at the moment I thought I would start with my two favourites seasons, Spring and Summer.
These two statues are part of a group of eight statues imported from Italy in 1883 and include Seasons, Boy Extracting Thorn, La Ballarina, Sweep Boy and a young girl with a scarf, clogs and musical instrument from the Donizetti opera ‘Linda di Chamonix’.
Sir Henry Parkes promoted the use of public sculpture to beautify the colony and for the so-called "uplifting of the lower orders" and used classical statuary in gardens to educate those who could not afford the "grand tour" and see sculpture like this for themselves.
Over time the statues at various times were removed and kept at the gardens in a shed known by staff as the Graveyard, as they had become subject to vandalism, decapitation and deterioration.
Good to see them out and about.
ReplyDeleteGreat to have them back.
ReplyDeleteHi Kim,
ReplyDeleteThank you for this post. I'm trying to find out a bit more about these sculptures especially the boy and girl from Linda di Chamonix. Would you have any advice where to find information, e.g. about the sculptor, their original purpose etc.?
Many thanks!
Hi Dorian I usually start with a general web search by putting the names into a search engine. From doing that I found a couple of places where I used information about the statues. One was The Australian Monuments and Statues site http://monumentaustralia.org.au/ I also found an article - Heritage marble statuary at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney by searching the internet.
DeleteI also looked on the Royal Botanic Gardens website as well.
I hope this helps
Cheers Kim