John Philip 'Pope' Davis, R.B.A.

The son of a Danish woodcarver from Iceland, Thorvaldsen entered the Copenhagen school of art where he won the travelling scholarship in 1792, the school’s highest award. In 1796 he set sail for Italy, where he spent the next twenty-three years. Based in Rome, the centre of the artistic world in the late eighteenth century, he quickly established himself as one of the most successful classical sculptors of his generation and was second only to Canova in his popularity and international acclaim. Following the latter’s death in 1822 Thorvaldsen succeeded Canova as the preeminent sculptor of choice among English collectors in particular. He was commissioned by the Pope for the Tomb of Pius VII in St. Peters, Rome, and his most famous works include the design for a pair of allegorical bas reliefs representing Night and Day, examples of which include those at Osborne House; and his magnificent Ganymede and the eagle, commissioned by the great collector George Granville, 2^nd Earl of Sutherland (Minneapolis Institute of Arts).

John Philip Davis was a friend of the history painter Benjamin Robert Haydon. He travelled to Rome in 1824, where he painted The Talbot Family receiving the Papal Benediction, whence he received the cognomen of ‘Pope Davis’, and exhibited the present work at the Academy on his return in 1826.