Sir Thomas Brock RA (1847 - 1922)

RA Collection: People and Organisations

Thomas Brock was born in Worcester, where he was educated at the Government School of Design and apprenticed to the Worcester Royal Porcelain Works. Aged nineteen he moved to London to become apprentice to the leading sculptor John Henry Foley (1866) before entering the Royal Academy Schools the following year.

Foley died suddenly in 1874, leaving Brock to complete most of his unfinished commissions. These included monuments to Daniel O’Connell and the bronze figure of Prince Albert at the centre of the Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens). Brock’s success in these projects put him in the perfect position to become a leading provider of portrait statue monuments, although he also made more imaginative works such as A Moment of Peril, depicting a native American threatened by a snake!

Brock designed the profile of Queen Victoria which appeared on coinage from 1891, and after the monarch’s death he was appointed to sculpt The Queen Victoria Memorial outside Buckingham Palace, which he worked on from 1901 until his death in 1922 (it was completed after his death). Unusually for such a large project no competition was held to choose the sculptor – Brock was invited by the memorial committee, his chief qualification being the number of likenesses of the queen he had already made.

Brock became an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1883, and a Member in 1891. He also received numerous other honours, including that of founder president of the Society of British Sculptors.