Untitled (Mother and Child) by Phoebe Gertrude Stabler (1879-1955). Inscribed: “Art Union of London 1907” Private Collection. [Click on images for larger pictures.] Formatting and perspective correction by George P. Landow. [You may use these images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
According to the Mapping Sculpture site, Stabler, a sculptor, modeller, potter's modeller, and black-and-white illustrator for important arts magazines, such as The Studio and Burlington Magazine, was “born in West Bromwich. . . the daughter of James McLeish (born c.1849), a boiler inspector for insurance company. . . . [She] studied at the School of Architecture and Applied Art, University College, Liverpool (1901-4) and at the Royal College of Art.” After marrying Harold Stabler, a silversmith, in 1906, she designed and created pottery figures, some of which her husband manufactured in Hammersmith. “After the First World War she made designs for the Ashtead Pottery and the firm Carter, Stabler, Adams (later the Poole Pottery) in which Harold was a partner. Phoebe and Harold collaborated on a number of projects in ceramics, of which the war memorial at Durban is the most striking example.”
Although Stabler is best known for her pottery figures, during the 1920s and 1930s she was also well known for her stone carvings and was an important contributor to the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley, 1924. For their stand at the exhibition, the Concrete Utilities Bureau (London) engaged Stabler to make work demonstrating the sculptural properties of concrete. Other artists also engaged on the project were Gilbert Bayes.
References
“Phoebe Gertrude Stabler ARBS.” Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951. University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011. Web. 29 September 2011.
Last modified 31 October 2011