I visited this excellent exhibition yesterday at Salisbury Museum. The elegiac and evocative images, each and collectively, evoked a symphony in black which has such depth and resonance when used on its own. The crisp lines of Eric Ravillious' prints bring the natural world into sharp relief while the textural, almost painterly, effects achieved by Charles Darwin’s granddaughter and friend of Rupert Brooke, Gwen Reverat, have a softness and ethereal quality. The soft, smoky underwater wonderland of Claire Leighton’s prints are another fascinating adaptation of the medium.
The Golden Age of this quintessentially British tradition (it was developed in the 18th century by Thomas Bewick), occurred between the two World Wars when the countryside seemed to put on a symbolic cloak of Albion for the national psyche scarred by the devastation of mechanised warfare. Rural pursuits such as rambling and geological ones such as archeology reached new audiences thirsty for knowledge of, and connection with, what was seen as a simpler, romantic bygone age. The Society of Wood Engravers was established in 1920.
The practice of wood engraving is in itself a labour of love. The slow, labour-intensive incising of lines into the end grains of hard wood such as Box, evolved from metal engraving and the tools used are much finer than those used for woodcuts. Practitioners of this art often turned to nature and natural forms for their inspiration as if the organic material and processes rhyme with the cycle of the seasons and natural growth.
I was particularly delighted to see such a abundance of work by my old teaching colleague Howard Phipps, a phenomenally talented engraver and worthy torchbearer of the tradition.
Ian Macnab - Snow on the Radnor Hills
Howard Phipps - Beech Tree Cloister
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