The original Gunnis Dictionary of British Sculpture 1660-1851 has been the standard reference work on British sculpture since it was first published in 1953 by Odhams Press. It was researched by Rupert Forbes Gunnis (London 1899– Reading 1965), a civil servant in the British colonial Government of Cyprus, and later curator of Tunbridge Wells Museum. A revision was printed in 1968. The book is considered a major scholarly work.
Under the editorship of Ingrid Roscoe, with assistance from her co-editors Emma Hardy and Greg Sullivan, work began in 2000 on revising the dictionary for the publication by Yale University Press of a new edition. The new edition covers sculptors who were active in Britain at any time between 1660 and 1851, irrespective of their country of origin and even if they also worked outside these dates. All of the artists listed in the original Gunnis remain, but new ones have been added, reflecting later research on the subject. The format of the new book is closely based upon the original Gunnis, each entry consisting of a biographical text followed by a list of works.
Famous quotes containing the words dictionary, sculpture and/or britain:
“The much vaunted male logic isn’t logical, because they display prejudices—against half the human race—that are considered prejudices according to any dictionary definition.”
—Eva Figes (b. 1932)
“You should go to picture-galleries and museums of sculpture to be acted upon, and not to express or try to form your own perfectly futile opinion. It makes no difference to you or the world what you may think of any work of art. That is not the question; the point is how it affects you. The picture is the judge of your capacity, not you of its excellence; the world has long ago passed its judgment upon it, and now it is for the work to estimate you.”
—Anna C. Brackett (1836–1911)
“Only in Britain could it be thought a defect to be “too clever by half.” The probability is that too many people are too stupid by three-quarters.”
—John Major (b. 1943)