(George) Rayner Hoff

Born 27 November 1894
Died 19 November 1937

Active: 1910 - 1937

Country of birth: Great Britain

Country of death: Australia

Sculptor, teacher, stonemason

Born Braddan, Isle of Man. He was the son of George Hoff (born c.1866, England), who was said to be a woodcarver and stonemason who restored ancient buildings. The Census Returns indicate George Hoff senior was a bricklayer and an employer in 1901 whilst a decade later he was working as a stonemason at Wollaton, near Nottingham, possibly on the estate of Wollaton Hall. By this time, George Rayner was serving an apprenticeship as a stonemason, almost certainly with his father, whilst also studying part-time at Nottingham School of Art (1910-15). The Australian Dictionary of National Biography states that the young Hoff worked in an architect's office form the age of 14. On 7 December 1915 he enlisted and entered military service with a cyclist company (3/1st No 16 District). After a year serving in France, Hoff was transferred to a topographical survey unit and made maps from aerial photographs for the remainder of the war.

After demobilization in 1919 Hoff returned to Nottingham School of Art and then attended the Royal College of Art, London (1920-21). In 1922 he entered the Rome Scholarship competition and was awarded first place. However, after a few weeks in Rome in early 1923 Hoff decided he could not afford to live on his scholarship stipend. As he had been offered a teaching position at East Sydney Technical College, Sydney, Australia, Hoff resigned his scholarship in April 1923. He taught drawing, modelling and sculpture at the East Sydney Technical College from 1923-31 and was then made Head of the Sculpture Department.

In Australia, Hoff exhibited with the Society of Artists, the Victorian Artists' Society and the Australian Sculptors' Society. He entered various official and prize exhibitions, and was awarded the Wynne prize in 1927. In 1937 he was a foundation council member of the short-lived Australian Academy of Art. Hoff's principal achievement was in public sculpture, and is now regarded as one of the most eminent Australian artists in this field of the inter-war period. He died suddenly of pancreatitis in Sydney after a surfing accident.

This record includes information from the Australian Dictionary of Biography and his file at the British School of Rome (particularly the form completed for his application for the Rome Scholarship and correspondence with the secretary, Evelyn Shaw). There is a book on Hoff entitled 'This Vital Flesh: the Sculpture of Rayner Hoff and his School' by Deborah Edwards and Virginia Spate, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 1999 and a more recent monograph by Deborah Beck entitled 'Rayner Hoff: the life of a sculptor', Newsouth publishers 2017.

Citing this record

'(George) Rayner Hoff', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/person.php?id=msib2_1220282474, accessed 08 Jun 2023]