Born in Lambeth, London in 1856 to a stone carver, Pomeroy, at age 14, became the principal earner when his father died, he supported his family as an apprentice to an architectural stone carving company. He went on to study at the Lambeth School of Art under Jules Dalou and William Silver Frith. Dalou’s naturalistic style of sculpture had a lasting influence on him. In 1880 he was admitted to the R.A. Schools, where he won a gold medal and a travelling scholarship in 1885. He went to Paris and studied under Antonin Mercie.
Born in Lambeth, London in 1856 to a stone carver, Pomeroy, at age 14, became the principal earner when his father died, he supported his family as an apprentice to an architectural stone carving company. He went on to study at the Lambeth School of Art under Jules Dalou and William Silver Frith. Dalou’s naturalistic style of sculpture had a lasting influence on him. In 1880 he was admitted to the R.A. Schools, where he won a gold medal and a travelling scholarship in 1885. He went to Paris and studied under Antonin Mercie.
Robert Anning Bell, Frederick William Pomeroy, 1908, Painted to mark Pomeroy’s year as Master of the Art Workers Guild
In 1887, after returning to London, Pomeroy joined the Art Workers Guild and subsequently exhibited with the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society. He was part of a group of artists, including Frith, who sculpted a French Renaissance-style tiered fountain, commissioned by Royal Doulton, and designed by Arthur Edward Pearce in honour of Queen Victoria, which is now situated on Glasgow Green. The first tier contains four allegorical groups, representing, Canada, India, Australia, and South Africa, of which Pomeroy modelled Australia.
The same year, Pomeroy met the church architect, John Dando Sedding, who commissioned him to create several decorative architectural pieces for churches in London and the southwest. Later, for the same architectural practice, he crafted a chimneypiece at Ladbroke Grove Library, and pieces for Welbeck Abbey and Douglas Castle. Pomeroy was also commissioned by the architect Edward William Mountford, for whom he created pieces for Paisley Town Hall, Sheffield Town Hall, Lancaster Town Hall, the figure of Lady Justice on the dome at the Old Bailey and figures inside the court as well as four colossal bronze figures for the upstream side of Vauxhall Bridge in London.
Pomeroy continued to create smaller pieces to exhibit which helped to cement his artistic reputation as a sculptor of the New Sculpture movement, a term coined by the art critic Edmund Gosse to define the British style of sculpture that had moved away from neoclassicism in favour of naturalism, with an emphasis on naturalistic poses and spiritual subjects. While Pomeroy’s carved marble replica of Frederic Leighton’s Athlete Wrestling with a Python (the piece often seen as the catalyst of the New Sculpture movement), wasn’t received as well as the original when it was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1891, his So on a Delphic Reed, 1888, Dionysus, 1890 and Love the Conqueror, 1893, won him artistic acclaim. Pomeroy exhibited eleven works during the 1890s at the Royal Academy and some of the statuettes were reproduced in smaller sizes for the domestic market and his Perseus was cast in various sizes, including much larger versions.
Pomeroy regularly exhibited at the International Society of Sculptors, Painters and Engravers, The Royal Academy Summer Show, The Aberdeen Artists Society, The Royal Scottish Academy, and the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts.
In 1906 Pomeroy was elected an Associate member of the Royal Academy, becoming a full member in 1917. In 1907 he became Master of the Art Workers Guild. He died in 1924 and a memorial to him can be found in St. James’ Church in Piccadilly.
Numerous museums hold examples of Pomeroy’s work including the Tate and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne, and Pollok House in Glasgow.
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