The sculptural output of medallist Frank Bowcher by Philip Attwood

Although little-known outside specialist circles, Frank Bowcher (1864-1938) was arguably the most prolific maker of artistic medals in Britain in the late nineteenth century and early years of the twentieth. Even less well-known is the fact that he was also a sculptor who worked on a larger, more monumental scale. Trained by Lanteri, apprenticed to Onslow Ford and promoted by Marion Spielmann, he went on to receive commissions from a wide range of organisations and individuals, designing and making memorial sculptures destined for locations in Britain and India. It is on these large works that this talk will focus.

Philip Attwood worked in the British Museum’s Department of Coins and Medals from 1979 until 2020, serving as Keeper of Coins and Medals from 2010. His many publications include the British Museum exhibition catalogue Artistic circles: the medal in Britain 1880-1918 (1992), the major catalogue Italian medals, c.1530-1600, in British public collections (2003), and most recently Mary Gillick sculptor and medallist (2022). He is editor of The Medal, president of the Fédération Internationale de la Médaille d’Art (FIDEM), and honorary curator of the Worshipful Company of Cutlers’ medal collection. He is currently working on a book on Frank Bowcher.