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Elected HRSA in 1827. The son of a Paisley builder and carpenter from whom he learnt the rudiments of drawing plans and elevsations. In 1799 a visit to a touring exhibition of wax works in Paisley inspired him to try his hand at modelling portrait busts in wax. His earliest attempt prove dunsuccessful but the collapse of his father's business soon after forced him to take this line up as a new livelihood and to pursue it he moved to Glasgow in 1800 where the patronage of the Duke of Hamilton secured him a string of commissions, and encouraged him to move, in 1803, to Edinburgh, where he studied at the Trustees Academy. In 1811 he travelled to London but was unimpressed by the City, however on a visit to Burlington House, the then home of the Royal Academy, he encountered the Elgin Marbles which made a lasting impression. Inspired by them he undertook a close study of them, culminating in the making of a series of small scale but very highly finished plaster bas relief panels for public sale (vide Perth Museum and Art Gallery for a good set of these). Two of his sons, John Henning jnr (1801-57) and Samuel Henning (c.1795-1832) were also sculptors working in their own right as well as assisting their father. (based on the entry in McEwan, Peter J M : The Dictionary of Scottish Art & Architecture, 2nd revised ed, 2004, p.250)