Harry Bates

- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Harry Bates was an important figure in the development of the New Sculpture movement. He attended South London Technical Art School, where he was taught by Dalou. He was admitted to the Royal Academy Schools in 1881 and subsequently worked in Paris, where he had contact with both Dalou and Rodin. Bates was profoundly influenced by Rodin in his view of sculpture as a means of expressing pure energy. Much of his work was in the form of low-relief panels.

Bates exhibited The Story of Psyche as three bronze reliefs at the Royal Academy in 1887. The panel to the left of the composition, showing Psyche abandoned on a rock, is reproduced in the present plaster. The central relief depicts Psyche being carried by the god of the west wind, Zephyr, towards Cupid, who is the subject of the third relief. Silvered bronze versions of the reliefs are housed in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, while a marble version of the whole composition, inscribed with the above verses by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, was sold at Sotheby's on 9 December 1993 (lot 102) in a gilt wood frame near-identical to the present lot.

The Story of Psyche was Bates' most popular and commercial work. In an exhibition at the Fine Art Society in 1902, a plaster relief panel was exhibited posthumously (no. 26). This was for sale at 65 gns. An annotated copy of this catalogue also notes that it was available in marble for 300 guineas and in bronze for 180 guineas.