Summers (Charles) Sir Redmond Barry {1860} SLV [SC]

Summers, Charles (1825-78; English)
Sir Redmond Barry 1860
Marble, 87.5 x 66.0 x 30.5 cm
Presented by subscribers, 1860; transferred from NGV to SLV, 1943
State Library of Victoria (LTS 2)

Barry (1813-80), the founder of the State Library of Victoria, the University of Melbourne and the Royal Melbourne Hospital, is shown here in appropriately heroic, alla antica style.

This work – one of the first acquisitions for the Melbourne collection – makes an interesting contrast with other portraits of the sitter produced during his lifetime, notably the earlier profile portrait by Summers’ pupil Margaret Thomas: Thomas Sir Redmond Barry 1856 {1881} SLV [SC]; and Woolner Sir Redmond Barry 1878 {1881} NGV [SC] (showing Barry in later life, only 2 years before his death).  

Refs.

SB, p.64 (Busts); NGV 1880, p.2; NGV 1894, p.130 (VI.Rotunda, no.16); NGV 1905, p.105 (IV. Vestibule, no.4)

For details and reproductions, see also SLV Art of the Collection (2007), p.41, also discussing Barry’s ambitions for Melbourne