william pink after agostino carlini, smugglerius, plaster cast, 1834. (original cast 1775)For generations, the cast of an unknown criminal dubbed with the mock Latin title of ‘Smugglerius’, has been used in the teaching of anatomical drawing at Edinburgh College of Art with no real knowledge of its provenance. This exhibition, developed as part of the ongoing restoration of the Edinburgh College of Art Cast Collection, at last reveals the man behind the cast.
In addition to detailed research which examines the history of the cast and the life of the man it was most likely moulded from, the exhibition includes original artworks created in response to Smugglerius and the theme of a past unveiled.
Dating from 1854, the College Smugglerius is a copy of an original écorché – a figure with the skin and fat removed to expose the muscles and tendons - made in 1776 at Royal Academy of Art in London. This earlier cast, now lost, was moulded from the body of a hanged criminal by the sculptor Agostino Carlini, following its dissection by William Hunter, the famous anatomist. The College cast, which retains the stunning detail of the original, was made by a little known ‘moulder and figure maker’ called William Pink, probably at the time of his employment at the British Museum; an inscription on the base of the cast states “Published by W PINK Moulder 1854”.
Since its arrival at the College, the cast has been used in the teaching of anatomy to art students, much as the original cast would have been used by artists at the Royal Academy, among them William Blake . In 2008, The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) awarded a grant of £498,500 for the conservation and restoration of Edinburgh College of Art’s 200-year-old Cast Collection, and as part of this, Smugglerius has been restored to its former glory... (continue reading @ artdaily.org)
