John Bacon (sculptor, born 1740)

[1][2] At the age of fourteen, John was apprenticed to Mr Crispe's porcelain manufactory at Lambeth, where he was at first employed in painting small ornamental pieces of china.

[1] Observing the models sent by different eminent sculptors to be fired at the adjoining pottery kiln determined the direction of his genius:[1] he began imitating them with such proficiency that a small figure of Peace[1] sent by him to the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts won a prize.

[3] During this period, he was led to improve the method of transferring the form of the model to the marble ("getting out the points") by the invention of a more perfect instrument for the purpose.

This instrument possessed many advantages: it was more exact, took a correct measurement in every direction, was contained in a small compass, and could be used on either the model or the marble.

In 1770, he exhibited a figure of Mars,[1] redone in marble the next year for Charles Pelhalm,[3] which gained him the gold medal from the Society of Arts and his election as an associate of the Royal Academy (ARA).

[1] Jealous competitors criticised him for ignorance of classic Greek sculpture, a charge he refuted with a bust of Jupiter Tonans.

[5] Bacon was considered the most successful public sculptor in England at the time and the church authorities awarded him the commissions for the next two statues erected in the cathedral, that of Samuel Johnson in 1795 and of the judge Sir William Jones in 1799.