Bronze and enamel on marble base
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Chantrey Bequest
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/gilbert-bayes-712" aria-label="More by Gilbert Bayes" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Gilbert Bayes</a>
Sigurd
Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1910
actions: postures and motions
adults
animals: mammals
arm / arms raised
Brünhilde
characters
emotions and human qualities
emotions, concepts and ideas
heroism
horse
Icelandic sagas
literature (not Shakespeare)
literature and fiction
man
Morris, William, ‘Sigurd the Volsung’
people
riding
society
tales, legends and traditional
transport: land
<p>William Morris's poem 'The Story of Sigurd the Volsung' (1877) was based on the Icelandic Sagas. It was well known but rarely the subject of works of art. It is quoted, around the base of this bronze, in Lombardic lettering. The shallow reliefs on the marble show on one side Brynhilde and on the other the death of Sigmund. Older sculptors, notably Alfred Gilbert, had made much in the 1890s of figures in medieval armour. Bayes here extended this interest to a dramatic pose and to decoration, adding coloured enamels to the bronze.</p><p><em>Gallery label, February 2010</em></p>
sculpture bronze enamel marble
20 March 2009 – 17 October 2010
2010-10-17
20 March 2009 – 17 October 2010
2010-10-17
2009-03-20
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-03-20
New Sculpture
Collection based display
1 March 2013 – 31 May 2013
2013-05-31
1 March 2013 – 31 May 2013
2013-05-31
2013-03-01
Yale Center for British Art (New Haven, USA)
http://ycba.yale.edu/index.asp
2013-03-01
Edwardian Opulence
Loan-out
Sigurd
object: 886 × 483 × 286 mm, 118.5 kg
Presented by the Trustees of the <a href="/search?gid=999999977" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Chantrey Bequest</a> 1910
<p>William Morris's poem 'The Story of Sigurd the Volsung' (1877) was based on the Icelandic Sagas. It was well known but rarely the subject of works of art. It is quoted, around the base of this bronze, in Lombardic lettering. The shallow reliefs on the marble show on one side Brynhilde and on the other the death of Sigmund. Older sculptors, notably Alfred Gilbert, had made much in the 1890s of figures in medieval armour. Bayes here extended this interest to a dramatic pose and to decoration, adding coloured enamels to the bronze.
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Display caption
2010-02-18T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><b>N02739</b> SIGURD <i>c.</i> 1910
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<br/>Inscr. around bronze base, ‘He who would win to the Heavens and be as the Gods on high/Must tremble nought at the road and the place where men-folk die’.
<br/>Bronze, with enamel on the horse's trappings, 28×19×11 1/4 (71×48×28·5), on marble base carved in relief, 6 7/8×18 1/4×10 1/4 (17·5×46·5×27·5).
<br/>Chantrey Purchase from the artist 1910.
<br/><i>Exh:</i> R.A., 1910 (1913).
<br/><i>Lit:</i> National Gallery of British Art [Tate Gallery], <i>Catalogue</i>, 1911, pp.8–9; Herbert Maryon, <i>Modern Sculpture</i>, 1933, pp.152, 173, the other version repr. pl.107 as that in the Tate; Eric Underwood, <i>A Short History of English Sculpture</i>, 1933, p.152.</p>
<p>A slightly altered version of the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/m/metal" title="Glossary definition for 'Metal'"><span>bronze</span></a> and enamel statuette exhibited, with a different base, at the R.A. in 1909 (1834; repr. <i>Royal <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/academy" title="Glossary definition for 'Academy'"><span>Academy</span></a> Pictures</i>, 1909, p.113). In this earlier <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/cast" title="Glossary definition for 'Cast'"><span>cast</span></a> Sigurd holds a ring (the Niblungen ring) instead of his sword, which hangs at his side; the other hand is also different and the horse's head is held higher. In other details the two versions are identical which suggests that the artist may have reworked his original <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/plaster-of-paris" title="Glossary definition for 'Plaster of Paris'"><span>plaster</span></a>.</p>
<p>The Tate version was first exhibited with a quotation from William Morris's <i>Sigurd the Volsung</i>, which quotation is also inscribed in Lombardic characters round the bronze base of the statuette. The <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/r/relief" title="Glossary definition for 'Relief'"><span>reliefs</span></a> on the two long sides of the marble base show two scenes from the same poem, Brynhilde with the Niblung brothers, Gunnar, Hogin and Guttorm, and their mother Grimhilde, and the body of Sigurd taken to burial; the patterns on the horse's trappings also contain motifs relating to the poem - for a full description see the catalogue cited above.</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture</i>, London 1964, I</p>
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Catalogue entry
2004-09-23T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
actions: postures and motions adults animals: mammals arm / arms raised Brünhilde characters emotions and human qualities emotions, concepts and ideas heroism horse Icelandic sagas literature and fiction literature (not Shakespeare) man Morris, William, ‘Sigurd the Volsung’ people riding society tales, legends and traditional transport: land