b Cardiff, 21 March 1860;
d London, 15 Dec 1952.
Welsh sculptor. He trained under his father Thomas John (1834–93) in 1874–81, executing wood-carving and marquetry details for the rebuilding of Cardiff Castle by William Burges for the 3rd Marquess of Bute. Burges encouraged his studies at the Cardiff School of Art. In 1881–6 he worked with Burges’s associate, the London sculptor Thomas Nicholls. Goscombe John learnt clay-modelling techniques from Jules Dalou at the Lambeth City and Guilds School of Art (1881–4) and encountered the New Sculpture movement of Frederic Leighton and Hamo Thorneycroft at the Royal Academy Schools (1884–7). In 1886–7 he worked for Charles Bell Birch (1832–93). He won the Royal Academy Gold Medal Travel Scholarship with Parting (1889; plaster, Cardiff, N. Mus.) and spent 1890–91 in Paris, where he modelled Morpheus (1890; bronze, Cardiff, N. Mus.), showing the influence of Rodin.


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