The Young Naturalist
by WEEKES, Henry, White marble, height 146 cm
This marble represents an idealised young girl tentatively approaching the waters edge, her hair and drapery billowing behind her. She is portrayed in contemporary dress, holding a starfish and standing on naturalistic seaweed-covered rocks.
This work is rare within Weekes’s oeuvre, which is overwhelmingly composed of portrait busts. It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1857, signed and dated: H. WEEKES, A.R.A. Sc. / 1857.