Highlights















Description

Reynolds Stone. 1960 woodcut engraving 'By Right Feline', an illustration around which Sylvia Townsend Warner wove her poems in Boxwood.

C.3.25x2.25ins. Unmounted. Faint text to reverse. Photos 2 and 3 are to show source and do not form part of the sale.

After taking his degree, in 1930, Reynolds Stone became an unofficial apprentice at the Cambridge University Press under Walter Lewis. Encouraged there by Mr Nobbs the press overseer, he began experimenting with engraving on metal and wood. He met Eric Gill on a train, who invited him to stay at Pigotts. He left after two weeks, having engraved an alphabet under Gill's supervision, who felt that at this point he had nothing further to teach him. He moved to Taunton to work at the printing firm of Barnicott and Pearce. During this time he engraved his first bookplate; other commissions followed, which allowed him to leave Barnicott and Pearce and became an engraver full time. Among many commissions he engraved his first Royal bookplate for Elizabeth of York (the Queen Mother), and engraved headings for the Nonesuch Shakespeare. In 1937 he engraved a Royal Coat of Arms for the coronation of King George VI, which was commissioned by Stanley Morison who became an important mentor and adviser. During the Second World War he worked as an aerial photographic interpreter for the RAF, and continued to engrave. Reynolds engraved the clock device, the court circular, and Royal Arms headings for The Times newspaper. He engraved the Royal Arms for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, and the official Coat of Arms for HMSO still seen on all official documents, including the British Passport. He engraved hundreds of bookplates (including Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears's and the Prince of Wales's), often with characteristic and elegant Italianate swirls and flourishes. He designed the u00a35 (1962) and u00a310 notes (1964) which were in use until decimalisation. He had several exhibitions, both through the Arts Council, notably in Aldeburgh in 1958, and at private galleries. He cut many important memorials in stone and slate, including those for Winston Churchill, Ralph Vaughan Williams and T S Eliot. Among the many books he illustrated were 'Apostate' (Forrest Reid), 'The Open Air' (Adrian Bell), 'Omoo' (Herman Melville); and uniquely, Sylvia Townsend Warner illustrated his engravings with poetry in 'Boxwood'.

u2018Good art shows us reality, which we too rarely see because it is veiled by our selfish cares, anxiety, vanity, pretension. Reynolds as artist, and as man, was a totally unpretentious being. His work, seemingly simple, gives to us that shock of beauty which shows how close, how in a sense ordinary, are the marvels of the worldu2019. Iris Murdoch from her memorial address 1979.

(Edited from the Reynolds Stone website.)