Artist.  Born in London, the youngest son of the engraver John Landseer. Edwin Landseer was something of a prodigy whose artistic talents were recognised early on. He studied under several artists, including his father, and the history painter Benjamin Robert Haydon, who encouraged the young Edwin to perform dissections in order to fully understand animal musculature and skeletal structure. Edwin’s life was entwined with the Royal Academy. At the age of 13, in 1815, he exhibited works there. Renowned for his paintings of horses and dogs. Included in his artistic achievements are the lion sculptures in Trafalgar Square. His dog paintings of the 1830′s are by far his most popular work, ‘Dignity and Impudence’ (1839) being the most famous of all. He was elected an Associate at the age of 24, and an Academician five years later in 1831. He was knighted in 1850. In 1858 the government commissioned Edwin to make four bronze lions for the base of Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square, following the rejection of a set in stone by Thomas Milnes. He accepted on the condition he would not have to start work for another nine months, and there was a further delay when he asked to be supplied with copies of casts of a real lion he knew were in the possession of the academy at Turin. The request proved complex, and the casts did not arrive until the summer of 1860. The lions were made at the Kensington studio of Carlo Marochetti, who also cast them. Work was slowed by Edwin’s ill health, and his fractious relationship with Marochetti. The sculptures were installed in 1867. In his late 30’s Edwin suffered what is now believed to be a substantial nervous breakdown, and for the rest of his life was troubled by recurring bouts of melancholy, hypochondria, and depression, often aggravated by alcohol and drug use. In the last few years of his life Edwin’s mental stability was problematic, and at the request of his family he was declared insane in July 1872. He died a year later. (bio by: Shock)