Léon-Joseph Chavalliaud (1858–1921)

Sculptor born at Rheims where he was apprenticed as a modeller in the studio of Hippolyte Bulteau. He afterwards received a scholarship from the town to enter the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris, where he studied under Alexandre Falguière, François Jouffroy and most importantly Louis-Auguste Roubaud (‘le jeune’). In 1880, he won a Prix de Rome with his Mère Spartiate, in 1885 and 1886 obtained honourable mentions, and in 1890 was elected a member of the Société des Artistes Français. Shortly afterwards he moved to England, where he stayed for about 15 years, living in Brixton, south London. He showed at the RA from 1893 onwards, his exhibits comprising portrait busts and statues in both bronze and marble. For a number of years he worked for Farmer & Brindley, in whose employment he executed the figure for the memorial to Cardinal Newman, 1896, Brompton Road, Kensington; effigies for the monuments to Bishop Richard Durnford, 1896, Chichester Cathedral, and Hugh Grosvenor, First Duke of Westminster, 1901, St. Mary, Eccleston, Cheshire; four marble and four bronze statues of explorers and navigators, 1897–98, for the Palm House, Sefton Park, Liverpool; and statues of Bishop Talbot and Sir Samuel Bignold, (c.1906), for niches on the frontage of G.J. Skipper’s Norwich Union building, Norwich. Chavalliaud also executed the memorial to Sarah Siddons (1897) for Paddington Green. He appears to have returned to France in the 1900s and died at Boissy-sans-Avoir, Yvelines.

Bibliography: T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of Kensington and Chelsea with Westminster South-West, Watford, 2023, pp. 129–31; T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of Liverpool, Liverpool, 1997, pp. 197–203; T. Cavanagh, Public Sculpture of South London, Liverpool, 2007, pp. 349–51; R. Cocke, Public Sculpture of Norfolk and Suffolk, Liverpool, 2013, p. 60; D.A. Cross, Public Sculpture of Lancashire and Cumbria, Liverpool, 2017, p. 150; Lord E. Gleichen, London’s Open-Air Statuary, London, 1928; A.S. Gray, Edwardian Architecture, London, 1985; Mapping Sculpture; Oxford Art Online – Benezit Dictionary of Artists.

Terry Cavanagh November 2022