Rayner Hoff
≈ 3 min read
Names in other languages
No names in other languages are held for this entry yet.
Article bodies are English and are not machine-translated. A name in another language is not a translation of the article.
George Rayner Hoff (27 November 1894 – 19 November 1937) was a British-born sculptor who mainly worked in Australia. He fought in World War I and is chiefly known for his war memorial work, particularly the sculptures on the Anzac War Memorial in Sydney.
George Rayner Hoff (27 November 1894 – 19 November 1937) was a British-born sculptor who mainly worked in Australia. He fought in World War I and is chiefly known for his war memorial work, particularly the sculptures on the Anzac War Memorial in Sydney.
Early life and training
Hoff was born in the parish of Braddan on the Isle of Man, the son of George Hoff, an English-born stone and wood carver of Dutch descent. The family later moved to Nottingham. Hoff began helping his father on architectural commissions at a very young age and attended the Nottingham School of Art. During World War I, he was in the British Army and fought in the trenches in France, an experience from which he was to draw most passionately in the creation of his various war memorials. Later in the war, he made maps based on aerial photographs. Returning from the trenches following the War he enrolled in the Royal College of Art in London studying under Francis Derwent Wood for three years. In 1922, Hoff won the British Prix de Rome which allowed him the opportunity to study in Rome.
Australian work
File:Raynor Hoff SLNSW FL19831781.jpg|Portrait of sculptor Rayner Hoff, Sydney, ca. 1934, by Harold Cazneaux File:ANZAC War Memorial 2002.jpg|Detail of monumental sculptures and reliefs, ANZAC War Memorial (1934), Hyde Park, Sydney. Image:ANZACWarMemorial3 gobeirne.jpg|Sacrifice, Anzac War Memorial Image:Holden logo history.png|The 1972 Holden logo evolved from the original designed by Hoff in 1928 (left). His modelling is in a lyrical, classical art-deco manner which effortlessly combines sensuous curves with geometric line patterns. Among his works is the emblem of the Holden Australian car company, a stylised 'Lion and Stone' symbol representing a legend of man's invention of the wheel.
Death
Hoff died on 19 November 1937, eight days before his 43rd birthday, and was survived by his wife and two daughters.
Further reading
Daele, Patrick and Roy Lumby, A Spirit of Progress: Art Deco Architecture in Australia, Craftsman House, Sydney, 1997 Edwards, Deborah, This Vital Flesh: The Sculpture of Rayner Hoff and His School, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 1999 Hedger, Michael, Public Sculpture in Australia, Craftsman House, 1995 Hutchison, Noel S. Hoff, George Rayner (1894 - 1937), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 9, Melbourne University Press, 1983, pp 322–323. Inglis, K.S., Sacred Places: War Memorials in the Australian Landscape, Melbourne University Press, Carlton South, 1998 Sturgeon, Graeme, The Development of Australian Sculpture 1788–1975, Thames & Hudson, London, 1978 Beck, Deborah, Rayner Hoff: The life of a sculptor, NewSouth Publishing, 2017
Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1371715942 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.
References
1 claim could not be tied to a specific sentence and is listed in the table below instead.