Samuel Nixon

Samuel Nixon (30 June 1804, London – 1854) was a portrait sculptor in London, England.

Career Nixon's workshop was at 2 White Hart, Bishopsgate (1838–1854). Nixon worked for his friend Henry Doulton who established Royal Doulton. He is most well known for the Devonshire granite sculpture of William IV (1844), which was originally located near London Bridge on King William St. and was moved to King William Walk in Greenwich in 1935. Gentleman's Magazine called it "a striking and imposing object… a masterpiece" and "one of the chief ornaments of the City of London." It was, they wrote, "admired by all who are capable of appreciating artistic genius."

He repeatedly exhibited at the Royal Academy (1824–1846).

Nixon also worked on Goldsmiths' Hall. He created the four marble statues of children that he entitled The Four Seasons (1844). The statues stand on four pedestals on the lower flight of the grand staircase. Gentleman's Magazine described as "a work of the highest merit ... such beautiful personifications." The white marble statues of "The Seasons" are described as "exquisite" and that Nixon achieved "extreme delicacy" with his "masterly chisel."

Family

Nixon was the seventh child of Thomas and Sarah Nixon, he was baptised at St Mary-at-Hill on 29 July. His elder brother was James Henry Nixon (1802–1857), a painter on glass. He was also the uncle of James Thomas Nixon.

Gallery

Works In 1826 he exhibited at the Royal Academy ‘The Shepherd,’ in 1828 ‘The Reconciliation of Adam and Eve after the Fall,’ in 1830 ‘The Birth of Venus,’ and in 1831 ‘The Infant Moses.’ Shakespeare (plaster bust after Shakespeare's funerary monument), City of London School (1846) John Stow, Plaster bust, (after bust in St Andrew Undershaft), City of London School Birth of Venus Dean Andrews (minister), St Nicolas Church, Great Bookham, Surrey The ‘Four Seasons’, Goldsmiths’ Hall, City of London, grand staircase William Johnson Rodber, St Mary-at-Hill (1843) Richard Cobden, Bronze statuette after S. Nixon. Marshall Library of Economics, Cambridge. (1846) George Wynch, Pett, Sussex (1836) The Gillespie Monument, St. John's Wood Chapel Philip Lucas (minister), Hackney (parish) (1830) Revd. George Avery Hatch, St Vedast Foster Lane (1837) Martha Hatch, daughter of Henry Emlyn of Windsor”, St Vedast Foster Lane John Marshall, St. Leonard's, Shoreditch Design for the principal door of the House of Lords, illustrating scenes from the life of Alfred the Great

Links Samuel Nixon – A Biographical Dictionary of Sculptors in Britain, 1660–1851 Dictionary of National Biography, vol. 41