Lilian Simpson Explained

M. Lilian Simpson (c.1871–1897) was a British sculptor.

Biography

During the 1890s, Simpson was a student at the National Art Training School, NATS, in London where she was taught by the sculptor Édouard Lantéri.[1] Among her contemporaries at NATS, which became the Royal College of Art in 1896, were a number of other notable female sculptors including Margaret Giles, Ruby Levick, Esther Moore, Florence Steele and Lucy Gwendolen Williams.[2] In 1894 Simpson won a gold medal and travelling scholarship in the National Art Competition for a silver low relief book cover.[1] While still a student, Simpson had two pieces of work, including a bronze casket, shown at the Royal Academy in London and also exhibited with the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society.[1] In 1896 and 1897 her work was also included in exhibitions in Leeds and Liverpool.[3] In 1897 she used the travelling scholarship she had won in 1894 to travel and study in Italy.[1] There she contracted typhoid fever and died later that year aged 26.[1] The British Library now holds her 1894 book cover.[4]

Notes and References

  1. Book: Susan Beattie. Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art / Yale University Press. 1983. The New Sculpture . 0300033591.
  2. Web site: University of Glasgow History of Art / HATII. Florence Harriet Steele . 2011. 24 October 2020. Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain & Ireland 1851–1951.
  3. Web site: University of Glasgow History of Art / HATII. Miss M L Simpson . 2011. 24 October 2020. Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain & Ireland 1851–1951.
  4. Web site: Database of Bookbindings. British Library. 24 October 2020.