The symbolism is old- fashioned. Perhaps symbolism always will be “conservative”. If you use symbols there is the presumption that they will be understood. It belongs perhaps in the 1890s. Rodin would have recognised the form of this monument but he would have laughed to scorn its primitive manifestation . It is thoroughly old-fashioned in a fairly superficial way. In terms of symbolism this focus on an isolated woman would have been understood by Rodin or Ibsen. But they would have found the work empty and banal. The tiny figure is supported by some kind of vague swirl or vortex.I have seen a report suggesting that this is a swirl of females, but cannot find any photos which suggest this.It would certainly be in keeping with the old-fashioned symbolism.
I have nothing much to say about the figure's nudity.If it is connected with the symbolism then that is fine by me. But the pose is inexpressive. Most monumental figures in the recent past have not been shown naked.Male portraits often have bare shoulders and partially naked chests. Sometimes, but not often, they wear a toga which has the function of simplifying the forms and associating the subject with some sort of status-a parliamentarian as perhaps a Roman senator.Some nude male memorials do exist.
The figure by Onslow-Ford in Oxford which serves as a memorial to Shelley is such a thing.It isn't a portrait of Shelley. It certainly does not represent him as he was cast from the sea at Viareggio. It is an idealised male figure representing pathos and the loss of great promise.This is what is clearly represented in the work. What Hambling's work represents is not clear.
Ms Hambling's sculpture is a poor likeness to Mary Wollstonecraft -if likeness be intended. A decent portrait exists by MW's contemporary John Opie and if it provided any inspiration to Hambling it nevertheless did not lead to anything resembling MW. Did it have to, you may ask. Perhaps it doesn't matter if the sculpture does not look like MW. You might quote the remark attributed to Michelangelo that no one would remember how an individual Medici actually looked in a hundred years or so after the chapel was completed. But in this case we do know in a reasonable way what Mary Wollstonecraft looked like.And if you take the view that likeness is unimportant then the sculpture fails all over again because it does not instantiate any feelings or ideas connected with feminism, as far as I can see.
I have mentioned elsewhere Dalou's ability to produce a striking and incisive modelled portrait of Delacroix. He did not have Delacroix as sitter and might have worked from photos or even Delacroix's self-portraits. Nevertheless he has produced an excellent portrait. It was of course founded on his superb understanding of anatomy.
That understanding is lacking in the Hambling and so it seems to me is any imaginative engagement with the subject. In this particular work the neck seems a little too long. The proportions of head and neck to the rest of the figure don't seem right.The attempt to model hair fails entirely.The modelling of the mouth and associated muscles is incompetent.In terms of the great tradition of sculpture this is poor.
The plinth is feeble and does not help to present the statue. Perhaps you don't want a C19 plinth which separates subject from audience. Well ,C19 plinths were much better designed than this one-or the support for the recent Fawcett memorial. They also served to focus on and protect the sculpture.They and the sculpture aimed for a certain coherence.The plinth here is dreadful.It is the most generic thing imaginable. In quality of work it reminds me of the awful mass produced gravestones which litter modern cemeteries. This base was never considered creatively as part of the whole. Rodin spent much time and energy studying the problems of presenting The Burghers of Calais. Should it be high, or low and accessible? Believe me, he did not think a plinth, support, or base was irrelevant.
Mary Wollstonecraft's commemoration was ,long overdue but this sculpture is a disaster.Britain is collecting a lot of monuments which have little artistic merit. There is now a craze for commemorating just about anything you care to think of. This has resulted in a cluttering of the environment of the environment with banal, sentimental, crass, feeble, unimaginative. This is one of them.
