Woolner, Thomas (1825-92; English)
Charles Joseph La Trobe 1853
Plaster medallion, 33.6 cm diameter
Signed and dated: T.Woolner Sc. 1853
Acquired by 1880 (?)
State Library of Victoria (H141489)
La Trobe, Victoria’s first governor (1851-54), was Woolner’s most important local patron between 1852 and 1854, when both men returned to England.
This medallion, possibly the work listed in the 1880 NGV catalogue under “Medallion Casts,” may be the original model for various bronze medallions produced at the time, including two documented as acquired for the pre-Felton collection in the late 1880s: Woolner La Trobe [larger bronze medallion] 1853 {1888} SLV [SC] and Woolner La Trobe [smaller bronze medallion] (1853) [1889] NGV [SC].
Refs.
NGV 1880, p.32: possibly this work)
See SLV online catalogue entry (reproduced as shown here), suggesting that this may be the original model
Besides the two pre-Felton bronze medallions noted above, there are also further bronze examples in the SLV, acquired later: LTS 19 [H29576], gift of Mrs Edith Wilson, 1967 (21.1 cm in diameter), and H2015.57, gift of Mrs Patricia Reynolds, 2015 (23 cm in diameter). Both the present plaster medallion and H29576 are reproduced by Caroline Clemente, “Thomas Woolner’s Portrait Medallion of C.J.La Trobe,” The La Trobe Journal 80 (Spring 2007), pp.52ff., esp.pp.58-59