Phaeton driving the chariot of the sun

John Simpson Mackennal (1832-1901), Phaeton driving the chariot of the sun, 1860, plaster relief, signed in the plaster lower left, 70 x 104 cm. Other Notes: the Scottish born John simpson Mackennal studied at the Collegiate Institution, Liverpool, while apprenticed as an architectural modeller. He arrived in Australia around 1852-54 and was unsuccessful on the Ballarat goldfields, returning to Melbourne he established an architectural modelling business with James Scurry around 1856. They were contracted to work under the supervision of Charles Summers on plaster figures and decorations for Parliament house, Melbourne and they also made figures for the facades of many other Melbourne public buildings, including the old meat market, the Law Courts and the Windsor Hotel. He taught his son Edgar Bertram who became one of Australia's most important sculptors of the late19th and early 20th century.