John Gibson was a Welsh Neoclassical sculptor who studied in Rome under Canova. He excelled chiefly in bas-relief, notably the two life-size works The Hours Leading the Horses of the Sun and Phaethon driving the Chariot of the Sun, but was also proficient in monumental and portrait statuary. He is famous for his statues of Sir Robert Peel, William Huskisson and Queen Victoria. Gibson was elected a Royal Academician in 1836, and left the contents of his studio to the Royal Academy, where many of his marbles and casts are currently on display.

Antonio Canova was an Italian Neoclassical sculptor, famous for his marble sculptures. Often regarded as the greatest of the Neoclassical artists, his sculpture was inspired by the Baroque and the classical revival, and has been characterised as having avoided the melodramatics of the former, and the cold artificiality of the latter.