Just before Easter (quite appropriately), I was commissioned to create this Crucifix from white paper butterflies for a client's daughter who is soon to recieve her first Holy Communion. I really enjoyed this commission, not least because it brought back memories of when I also recieved my first Holy Communion as a child.
The other reason I enjoyed creating this piece is because the client understood something of butterfly mythology and their Christian symbolism. The butterfly has long been a symbol of the Christian story of the resurrection, and a parallel of Jesus' life. The butterfly starts out living an earthly life as a caterpillar before disappearing into a cocoon and appears dead, (Jesus entombed), but emerges later, transfomed, (Jesus resurrected), far more beautiful and powerful than before.
Last week at Bonhams auction house, Old Bond Street, London, there was a major sale of linocut prints from the 1920's and 30's of the Grosvenor School and work from other avant-garde printmakers from the same period. I first discovered these amazing prints at the Redfern Gallery on Cork street some years ago when I first moved to London, and loved the power of their graphic imagery instantly.
The Grosvenor School of Modern Art was established in 1925 at 33 Warwick Square in London. The aim of the school was for students to explore contemporary themes and work in new or progressive media. The term Grosvenor School is used nowadays to denote the group of artists and printmakers associated with the school who helped establish the colour linocut in Britain. The course tutor (1926-1933) was Claude Flight who was aware of the major art movements in Paris and advocated the use of the colour linocut as a progressive form of image making in Britain. The modernist subject matter of Grosvenor school prints was fairly notorious in the 1930's as they were so different in look and feel to the more traditional etchings of the time.
The main influence on the group was the work of the Italian Futurist movement. The Italian Futurist movement developed in 1909. They focused on the dynamic, energetic violence of modern city life. Their aim in particular was to emphasise the power, force and motion of machinery combined with the contemporary fascination for speed whilst denouncing the 'static' art of the past. The driving force behind the movement was the poet FT Marinetti.
I absolutely love the process of linocutting, being a linocutter, and collector of linocuts, in a modest way, myself. The prints of the Grosvenor School are dynamic, beautiful and of their time, though sadly, now out of their original remit, of being affordable to the average person.
Linocutting is a printmaking process that is gradually coming back into fashion through the work of artists such as, Edward Bawden, (and his son Richard), Gary Hume and Angie Lewin. There are other contemporary linocutters who are using the work of the Grosvenor School printmakers as a more obvious inspiration for their work, such as Gail Brodholt, and Paul Cleden. The recent sale at Bonhams, saw sales of Grosvenor School linoprints reach eye watering prices as demonstrated below. The main artists of the Grosvenor School were:-
Claude Flight:
Street Singers print sold for £79,250
Cyril Power:
Whence and Whither print sold for £97,250
Tube Station, sold for £61,250
Speed Trial, (which the seller bought for £20 originally), sold for £73, 250
Sybil Andrews:
Speedway, sold for £79, 250
The Winch, sold for £22,500
Sledgehammer, sold for £27, 500
Racing, sold for £46, 850
Other artists considered minor in the Grosvenor School canon (Ethel Spowers, Leonard Beaumont, Ursula Fooks), still achieved respectable prices at the sale also. A further selection of these wonderful, dynamic prints can also be seen at:- Osbourne Samuel Gallery, 23a Bruton St. W1J 6QG, in a show entitled: The Cutting Edge of Modernity: Grosvenor School Linocuts, April 11th - May 11th.
I was asked to make a companion piece, similar to the large silver Periphery commission that I completed earlier this year, by the Pond Gallery. I decided to make this new piece with gold leaf, so set about preparing and gilding the paper, (which takes on a lovely leathery texture when gilded), then set about cutting out another 160 Sweet Potato Acraea butterfly shapes. Once all of the butterflies were cut, they were meticulously arranged in the circles and then glued into place. It was a labour of love and the framed finished piece measures just under 1 metre square. It is available to view and purchase at the Pond Gallery.
Periphery (Gold) 2013
