Benjamin Creswick was born in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England on 29 January 1853 and served an apprenticeship as a knife-grinder. His talent as an artist was discovered by John Ruskin whom he met in 1877 and was to be his patron for several years. At the encouragement of Ruskin he took up sculpture and began modelling in clay at at the Ruskin School of Drawing in Oxford and in Coniston. Ruskin also introduced Creswick to A. H. Mackmurdo, co-founder of the Century Guild for whom he designed a number of pieces and worked on the decoration of Pownall Hall in Cheshire. With financial aid from Ruskin, he opened a studio in London c.1884.

Creswick was proficient in a variety of media including metal, wood and plaster. In 1889 he was appointed Head Teacher of the new modelling department at Birmingham Municipal School of Art where he taught until 1918.

He exhibited at the Royal; Academy in London; the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists; Sheffield Society of Artists; and at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. In 1914 he was elected a member of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists (RBSA).

Notable among his commissions were carved stone medallion busts of famous authors for Leeds Central Library (1884); friezes in Cutler’s Hall, London (1887-88); carved wooden figures for the Unitarian Memorial Church in Wallasey, Cheshire, a commission awarded by the Bromsgrove Guild (1889); decorative panels for Bloomsbury Library in Birmingham (1890); 'Scenes from Birmingham’s Industrial Past" for Handsworth Library(1891); and a memorial sculpture for Sutton Park, Birmingham (1920). The sculpture, which features an adult teaching a child to swim, was later relocated to Wyndley Leisure Centre's Swimming Baths

In 1903 Creswick settled in Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire where he died 1946. He was buried at St Michael’s Boldmere, Sutton Coldfield on 1 February 1946.

_{Text source: Art History Research net (AHR net)}