William Jabez Muckley (March 23, 1829 – August 30, 1905) was a noted

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artist who was born at

Wordsley Wordsley is a suburban area of Stourbridge in the West Midlands, England. It is part of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley and falls into the Stourbridge (DY8) postcode and address area, being just north of the River Stour. Wordsley is part of the ...

Kingswinford Kingswinford is a town of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley in the English West Midlands, situated west-southwest of central Dudley. In 2011 the area had a population of 25,191, down from 25,808 at the 2001 Census. The current economic focus ...

, in

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

. He was the eldest of the seven children of Jabez Muckley who was a glass artisan. William Jabez Muckley began his career as a glasscutter with W.H. B. & J. Richardson of Wordsley and became their principal

designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exp ...

and engraver. When only 22, he was responsible for much of the

engraving Engraving is the practice of incising a design onto a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ...

that earned the firm considerable praise in the

Great Exhibition The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, also known as the Great Exhibition or the Crystal Palace Exhibition (in reference to the temporary The Crystal Palace, structure in which it was held), was an International Exhib ...

of 1851. After the Richardson glass firm was declared insolvent in 1852 Muckley joined the

Birmingham School of Art The Birmingham School of Art was a municipal art school based in the centre of Birmingham, England. Although the organisation was absorbed by Birmingham Polytechnic in 1971 and is now part of Birmingham City University's Faculty of Arts, Design a ...

. He won one of the eight

scholarship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need. Scholarsh ...

s competed for by students at all the art schools in

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. He went on to study in

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and

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and obtained four art degrees of the highest class. He was head of the

Burslem School of Art Burslem School of Art was an art school in the centre of the town of Burslem in the Potteries district of England. Students from the school played an important role in the local pottery industry. Pottery was made on the site of the school from th ...

for five years in the late 1850s and then went on to be

headmaster A head master, head instructor, bureaucrat, headmistress, head, chancellor, principal or school director (sometimes another title is used) is the teacher, staff member of a school with the greatest responsibility for the management of the school ...

of Wolverhampton School of Art. In 1862 he became principal of

Manchester School of Art Manchester School of Art in Manchester, England, was established in 1838 as the Manchester School of Design. It is the second oldest art school in the United Kingdom after the Royal College of Art which was founded the year before. It is now par ...

. He exhibited at the

Royal Academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly in London. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its pur ...

1859–1904 and at

Suffolk Street The Royal Society of British Artists (RBA) is a British art body established in 1823 as the Society of British Artists, as an alternative to the Royal Academy. History The RBA commenced with twenty-seven members, and took until 1876 to reach fi ...

, the

Royal Institution The Royal Institution of Great Britain (often the Royal Institution, Ri or RI) is an organisation for scientific education and research, based in the City of Westminster. It was founded in 1799 by the leading British scientists of the age, inc ...

and

Grosvenor Gallery The Grosvenor Gallery was an art gallery in London founded in 1877 by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Blanche. Its first directors were J. Comyns Carr and Charles Hallé. The gallery proved crucial to the Aesthetic Movement because it provided ...

. In 1878 he wrote ''The Student's Manual of Artistic Anatomy'', with 25 plates of the

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s and surface

muscle Skeletal muscles (commonly referred to as muscles) are organs of the vertebrate muscular system and typically are attached by tendons to bones of a skeleton. The muscle cells of skeletal muscles are much longer than in the other types of muscl ...

s of the human figure, together with a description of the origin, insertion and use of the muscles, and in 1882 wrote ''A Handbook for Painters and Art Students'' about the character, nature and use of colours, their permanent or fugitive qualities and the proper vehicles to employ, also short remarks on the practice of

painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...

in oil and water colours, and wrote two other books. Muckley retired to White Notley Hall,

Witham Witham () is a town in the county of Essex in the East of England, with a population ( 2011 census) of 25,353. It is part of the District of Braintree and is twinned with the town of Waldbröl, Germany. Witham stands between the city of Chelms ...

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about 1900 and died at home in 1905.

Family

Muckley's father Jabez was at various times a glasscutter, a glassworks manager and a

glass Glass is a non-crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling (quenching) of ...

importer. His younger brother Joseph Fairfax Muckley was the engraver of the very fine Muckley GobletGoblet - The Muckley Goblet - Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery Information Centre
at www.bmagic.org.uk on display in

Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery (BM&AG) is a museum and art gallery in Birmingham, England. It has a collection of international importance covering fine art, ceramics, metalwork, jewellery, natural history, archaeology, ethnography, local h ...

(Accession No. 1937M744), although some sources attribute this to William Jabez Muckley himself. William's son Angelo Fairfax Muckley (1859–1920) was also an artist who illustrated many published works. A nephew, Louis Fairfax Muckley, (1862–1926) also illustrated books, most notably the 1897 Dent edition of ''

The Faerie Queene ''The Faerie Queene'' is an English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. Books IIII were first published in 1590, then republished in 1596 together with books IVVI. ''The Faerie Queene'' is notable for its form: at over 36,000 lines and over 4,000 sta ...

'' by

Edmund Spenser Edmund Spenser (; 1552/1553 – 13 January 1599) was an English poet best known for ''The Faerie Queene'', an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty and Elizabeth I. He is recognized as one of the premier craftsmen of ...

. A couple of

Pre-Raphaelite The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (later known as the Pre-Raphaelites) was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, James ...

examples of Louis Fairfax Muckley's work (attributed by some to Angelo Fairfax Muckley) are a

"Autumn" was bought in, after an estimate of £20-30,000, at

Christie's Christie's is a British auction house founded in 1766 by James Christie (auctioneer), James Christie. Its main premises are on King Street, St James's in London, at Rockefeller Center in New York City and at Alexandra House in Hong Kong. It is ...

London in June 2003.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Muckley, William Jabez 1829 births 1905 deaths Alumni of the Birmingham School of Art