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Title:
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Princess Gouramma of Coorg
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Artist: |
Baron Carlo Marochetti
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Princess Gouramma was the daughter of the deposed Rajah of Coorg, brought to London by her father in 1852, where she was accommodated in Buckingham Palace, after being presented to the Queen. She was baptised and given the Christian name Victoria, the Queen standing as Godmother to her. This is indicated in the bust by the cross she wears around her neck. In 1860 she married a British army officer, but died of consumption in 1864 at the age of only twenty three. This is one of two busts of Indian favourites of the Royal Family, which Marochetti executed in 1856. The other was of Maharajah Dalip Singh, who it was hoped might be interested in marriage with Gouramma. In the case of both busts, colour was introduced, and the person responsible for applying it was William T. Millais, brother of the Preraphaelite painter. News would have reached England by this time of the "Tinted Venus", which John Gibson was working on in Rome, and which would be shown by him at the London International Exhibition of 1862. However Marochetti's approach was much more thoroughgoing and naturalistic. Henry Greville met Marochetti at a dinner at Holland House, and, on 26 Aug.1856, wrote to the painter Frederic Leighton, that Marochetti considered those English sculptors who were unable to accept coloured sculpture to be imbeciles. He went on, "Gibson is the only one who admits it, but even he will not go to Marochetti's lengths".(Mrs Russell Barrington, Life, Letters and Work of Frederic Leighton, London, 1906, vol.I, p.261). Evidently Queen Victoria did not disapprove of the colouring of her marble version of this bust, as she did in the case of Marochetti's bust of Dalip Singh, where she insisted the colour be removed. (For a fuller account of these two busts, see Caroline Hedengren-Dillon, Polychromy in the Work of Baron Carlo Marochetti (1805-1867). Part 1, on The Victorian Web.
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Material(s): |
Plaster
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Medium: |
Unassigned |
Finish: |
- |
Technique: |
Cast |
Genre: |
Portrait Bust
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Colours: |
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Year: |
1856 |
Height: |
0 metres |
Width: |
0 metres |
Depth: |
0 metres |
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Key: |
2285 |
Acc. No.: |
2285 |
Col. No.: |
2285 |
Number of views: |
2478 |
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