John Cheere

(b London, 1709; d London, 1787). Brother of (1) Sir Henry Cheere. He was the more famous of the two in his day, and his contribution to English sculpture was arguably more significant. He was apprenticed to a haberdasher in 1725 for seven years. His only signed monuments are that to James Lawes (d 1733), a marble portrait bust set against a pyramid in St Andrew's, Halfway Tree, Jamaica, and the marble tablet to his mother-in-law, Deborah Gibbons, at St Peter's Vere, Jamaica. In 1739 he completed a gilt equestrian statue of William III for St James's Square, London, and in 1751 a marble statue of George II for the market place, St Helier, Jersey. In 1739 he had also acquired a yard at Hyde Park Corner that may have belonged originally to Anthony van Nost, a younger member of the family of sculptors, and continued the van Nost and Andrew Carpenter tradition of supplying lead garden statuary. For Stourhead, Wilts, NT (see STOURHEAD), he supplied in 1751 a River God; in 1756 the Portuguese minister in London purchased from him 98 lead statues for the royal palace of Queluz, near Lisbon. More statues, including those of Pomona, Mercury, Apollo and Bacchus, were supplied to Stourhead in 1766. In 1769 the actor David Garrick commissioned a life-size lead figure of William Shakespeare for the jubilee celebrations at Stratford-on-Avon, Warwicks (now in the Town Hall).

Part of the Cheere family

See the Abbreviations for further details.

Shepherdess (c. 1760-70), at Kew Gardens, London.

John Cheere (1709–1787) was an English sculptor, born in London. Brother of the sculptor Sir Henry Cheere, he was originally apprenticed as a haberdasher from 1725 to 1732. Among his works were a gilt equestrian statue of William III in St James's Square, London, made in 1739, and a gilded lead statue of George II for Saint Helier, Jersey, in 1751. His most lasting legacy, however, is probably his lead statues for gardens. This kind of sculptures were popular for the summer houses of the 18th century’s aristocracy. Some were reproductions of classical Roman or Greek sculptures, but there was also a demand for statues depicting simple, pastoral themes. In 1756, the Portuguese minister in London placed an order with Cheere for 98 lead sculptures for the royal palace of Queluz. He also created several mythological statues for the gardens at Stourhead in 1751 and 1766, and a life-size lead figure of William Shakespeare for the jubilee celebrations in Stratford-on-Avon in 1769, on the commission of actor the David Garrick. Cheere died in London in 1787.

Several of the sculptures from Queluz had not been on public view since 1967 and have been restored by Rupert Harris Conservation, in London, and returned to Portugal in May 2009.^[1]. This restoration was in part made possible by the World Monuments Fund-Britain.

George II (1751) in the Royal Square, Saint Helier

References

1. ^ Público Newspaper 25 05 09

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