Alfred Stevens

Alfred George Stevens (30 December 18171 May 1875), was a British sculptor. His major work is the monument to the Duke of Wellington in St Paul's Cathedral.

Early life Alfred Stevens was born on 30 December 1817 at Blandford Forum in Dorset, the son of a decorator and joiner. At the age of ten, he entered his father's workshop as an assistant. In 1833, the rector of his parish enabled him to go to Italy, where he spent nine years studying at Naples, Bologna, Siena, Pompeii, Capri, Rome, Milan, Venice, and Florence where he studied for a time at the Accademia di Belle Arti. Stevens had never attended an English school. In 1841, Bertel Thorvaldsen employed him for a year in Rome. After a significant period of study and training throughout Italy, Stevens returned to England.

Career In 1845, Stevens obtained a tutorial position in the Government School of Design at Somerset House, London, where he remained until 1847. In 1850 he became chief artist to the Sheffield firm of H.E. Hoole and Co. who specialised in bronze and metal work. While in Sheffield it is thought that Stevens devised plans which were eventually integrated into the design of the ornate gateway of the Green Lane Works of 1860. In 1852 he returned to London. To this period belongs his design for the vases on the railings in front of the British Museum, and also the lions on the dwarf posts which were subsequently transferred to the inside of the museum.

In 1856, Stevens took part in the competition for the Wellington monument, originally intended to be set up under one of the great arches of St Paul's Cathedral, though it was only consigned to that position in 1892. Stevens agreed to carry out the monument for £20,000 – a quite derisory sum, as it turned out. Stevens devoted most of his career to this grand monument, constantly harassed and finally worn out by the interference of government, want of money and other difficulties.

Owing to the many years he spent on this one work Stevens produced little other sculpture. In Dorchester House (demolished in 1929 to make way for the hotel of the same name), Park Lane, there was some of his work, most notably a mantelpiece supported by nude female caryatids in a crouching attitude, modelled with great largeness of style, He died suddenly in his studio at 9 Eton Villas, Belsize Park, London, aged 57. The cause of his death is unspecified. He is buried in the western part of Highgate Cemetery in North London. His grave is a Grade II listed structure.

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